Sketches in history : chiefly ecclesiastical

T

SKETCHES IN HISTORY

SKETCHES IN HISTORY

CHIEFLY ECCLESIASTICAL

BY

L. C. CASARTELLI

BISHOP OF SALFORD

R. & T. WASHBOURNE

4 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON

BENZIGER BROS. : NEW YORK, CINCINNATI AND CHICAGO

1906

TO
THE RIGHT REV.

ADOLPHE HEBBELYNCK, D.D.,

RECTOR MAGNIFICUS OF MY ALMA MATER

THE UNIVERSITY OF LOUVAIN

BY KIND PERMISSION

DEDICATED.

PREFACE

THE sketches here reprinted, with few exceptions,
appeared originally in the pages of the Dublin Review.

They do not pretend to be in any way original con
tributions, but merely amateur essays in a few of the
more or less unfamiliar by-ways of history, chiefly
ecclesiastical, based upon modern writers, whose books
are indicated. The only excuse for their republication
is in the hope that they may prove of some interest to
Catholic readers, and especially that they may stimu
late in some of our ecclesiastical students a taste for
historical reading and study so urgent a need at the
present day. For this purpose I have added a list of
the best books that may be consulted on each subject
as an incentive to further research.

The article numbered IV. was originally published
by the C.T.S. ; No. IX. appeared in the Rosary ;
No. XIII. in the Tablet ; whilst No. X. was first issued
as a separate pamphlet. The rest appeared in the
Dublin. To the Editors of the latter review and of
the other periodicals just mentioned I return my thanks
for permission to reprint.

vi PREFACE

I have in every case endeavoured, by suitable
modifications, to bring the essays up to date by the aid
of more recent publications, and have sometimes partly
recast them.

For the excellent index I am deeply indebted to my
former pupil, Mr. Joseph Lomax, of Oscott College.

^ L. C. C.

ST. BEDE S COLLEGE,

September 15, 1905.

CONTENTS

9

PAGE

I. THE ART OF BURIAL I

II. THE LOMBARDS - 26

III. THE ENGLISH POPE - - 52

IV. THE CHURCH AND THE PRINTING-PRESS - QO
V. THE DUTCH POPE - - 104

VI. THE ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFORMA
TION - 154
VII. TWO ENGLISH SCHOLARS AND THE BEGINNINGS

OF ORIENTAL STUDIES IN LOUVAIN - - 1 86

VIII. OXFORD AND LOUVAIN - 197

IX. THE LITANY OF LORETO AND ITS HISTORY - 222

X. A FORGOTTEN CHAPTER OF THE SECOND SPRING- 238

XI. THE MAKERS OF THE DUBLIN - 269

XII. THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN - - 300

XIII. THE DANCING PROCESSION AT ECHTERNACH - 344

APPENDIX - - 354

INDEX - - - - - - 355

vii

SKETCHES IN HISTORY

i

THE ART OF BURIAL

IF my illustrious townsman Thomas de Quincey was
justified in entitling one of his most famous essays " On
Murder as a Fine Art," perhaps I, too, may plead
justification for the title I have ventured to give to the
present essay.

Murder, indeed, may be fittingly described as a " fine
art," in the sense that it is not a necessity of human life,
but, as the cynic might say, rather a luxury an unneces
sary luxury of civilization. Burial, on the other hand,
or, to put it more exactly, the disposal of the remains
of our dead is pre-eminently a " useful art " ; nay,
oftentimes one of the most necessary of all. The dead
we have always with us. The most cultured nation of
the twentieth century, as well as the most degraded
savage horde of Africa or Australia ; the men of the
earliest dawn of human history at the beginning of the
Stone Age, as well as those who shall be on earth long
after our own time ; of whatever race, tongue, religion,
degree of civilization, epoch of history, or region of the
habitable globe all have been, are, and ever will be
constantly face to face with the problem : what to do
with the remains of their dead ? To say nothing of the
philosophical or religious beliefs or theories involved, the
mere exigencies of sanitary needs are perpetually pressing

2 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

this problem upon the attention of the survivors. And
the more men prosper and multiply, the more great
civilizations are built up, the more imperious becomes
the necessity for a solution of the problem. And in this
man is at once differentiated from the lower animals.
Man, it will be remembered, has been ingeniously defined
as " the only animal that cooks its food." We may
venture to offer yet another definition : Man is the only
animal that buries its dead.

So much for the importance of the subject, which has
been dealt with in an exhaustive manner by a Belgian
Catholic writer, a physician of distinction, Dr. Isidore
Bauwens. His work, entitled " History and Description
of Funeral and Mourning Customs among the Principal
Nations," was published in Brussels in 1888. Unfortu
nately, this meritorious volume has attracted little if
any notice, owing to the fact that it is written in Flemish,
and so not generally accessible to the reading public. It
deserves, however, to be more widely read, for, as far as
I can judge, it not only contains a store of really inter
esting facts, but its able writer has gathered his materials
with commendable diligence from the most recent and
best authenticated sources, and hence may be relied
upon as a trustworthy authority. The present paper is
little else than a brief analysis of Dr. Bauwens book,
with a selection of some of his innumerable facts, and,
following him, I shall attempt to lay before the reader,
in historical form, a sketch of what is known of the
various methods of disposing of the dead practised by
the chief races of mankind in ancient as in modern times.
The remarks or additions of my own are few and far
between. As my task is purely expository, the reader
will understand that I do not necessarily commit myself
to all the theories or views enunciated by the author
whom I have the pleasure of introducing to English
readers.

THE ART OF BURIAL

It may be useful to recall that, according to the con
clusions of modern geologists, man made his first appear
ance on earth during the Quarternary period of geological
history, and in that part of it which is known as the
" Palaeolithic/ or Old Stone Age, from the fact that, in
the absence of any knowledge of the metals, these pre
historic races made use of weapons and implements of
roughly-hewn or split flint. Several races of man, dis
tinguished by the physical characters of their remains,
inhabited the greater part of Europe, portions of Asia
and Africa, and of North America, during this period. It
is customary to distinguish these races by the name of the
localities where the most typical specimens of their
remains have been found. Let us mention the three
principal of these : (i) The " Canstadt," or " Neander
thal," or " Spy race," inhabiting especially the valleys
of the Rhine and Seine, and probably extending to Italy
and Bohemia men of gigantic stature, dolichocephalous,
with low receding brows, and skulls pointed behind,
evidently savages of brutal appearance, and contem
poraries of the great extinct quadrupeds which once
roamed over Europe. (2) In strong contrast to these,
the so-called " Cro-Magnon race," inhabiting South-West
France, Italy, and the valley of the Meuse, gigantic in
stature, and dolichocephalous like the former, but of
handsome and intellectual appearance. These must have
existed in Europe long after the Canstadt race, for, at
least in the fourth of the progressive stages of their history
which have been distinguished by archaeologists, all the
great mammalia, except the mammoth and the rhino
ceros, had disappeared, while the reindeer browsed
peacefully over the greater part of Europe. With these
Cro-Magnon men appear, too, the earliest traces of
human art, the curious outlines of mammoth or reindeer
upon fragments of ivory or horn, which may be seen in
some of our museums. (3) Contemporaneously with the

i 2

4 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

race just described, portions of modern Belgium were
inhabited by the small, squat, brachycephalic race, very
like the modern Lapps, who are perhaps their descen
dants, known to science as the " Furfooz race."

Now, of all the above races of the Palaeolithic period
the earliest human races of which Science has been able
to find any trace one broad statement may be made :
that they all practised burial of the dead, in many cases
with conspicuous care and the accompaniment of tokens
of respect and veneration, and that no single trace of
cremation in any form appears.

A great gap separates the period we have described
from that known as the " Neolithic " or Polished Stone
Age. Great changes of surface have by this time taken
place. The sea, which had covered the modern Nether
lands, has retired and left the flat country as it now
exists. The race of men who occupy Europe has attained
a very much higher level of culture. Together with the
much finer, polished, or worked flint implements, has
come in the practice of agriculture and other arts
of life.

This is the period, too, of the " Lake Dwellers," who
in the lakes of Switzerland, as well as those of Lombardy,
Austria, and parts of Germany, built their curious
villages, raised on piles above the surface of the water.
But what particularly distinguishes the Neolithic period
is that it was a time of the great stone buildings, the age
of the well-known dolmens, cromlechs, menhirs, barrows,
or mounds, scattered over England, Ireland, France,
Scandinavia, and North America, and which, as Mr.
E. B. Tyler writes, " may be traced in a remarkable line
on the map from India across to North Africa, and up to
the west side of Europe." I perhaps hardly need remind
the reader of the wonderful monument of Stonehenge
in this country. It is now pretty well established that
nearly all, if not all, these curious stone erections, in
their various forms and under their varied names,
were nothing else than funeral monuments, vast graves,

THE ART OF BURIAL 5

sometimes, as in the great burial mound of Karlby, in
Gothland, still containing as many as eighty skeletons.
It is remarkable that in the majority of these graves the
bodies are found in the sitting or crouching position,
which, as we shall see later on, is so common in many
other parts of the world. The bodies of those buried in
these structures are generally surrounded with a large
number of weapons, ornaments, trinkets, and amulets.

Now, it is to be remarked that, though the great stone
monuments of this age bear witness to the universality
of inhumation, it is precisely in the same period that the
first traces of the practice of cremation begin to appear,
and this is also true with regard to the Lake Dwellings
already referred to. But the practice was undoubtedly
as yet only exceptional, and in some cases inhumated
bodies and the ashes of those that have been cremated
appear in one and the same grave.

Let me here add a remark with reference to both of the
prehistoric periods with which we have already dealt.
There are evidences in many sepultures of both the
Palaeolithic and Neolithic periods that some at least of
the races practised that extraordinary custom which is
still found among several widely scattered peoples of the
present day that, namely, of stripping the bodies of the
dead of the flesh before the burial of the bones, which
latter are occasionally found painted with a red colour.
The meaning or object of this strange custom, whether
ancient or modern, has not, as far as I know, been
satisfactorily explained.

I must claim my reader s indulgence for a few moments
whilst I refer in some detail to the remarkable and in
structive discoveries of my distinguished friends MM.
Henri and Louis Siret of Antwerp, two brilliant young
students of the University of Louvain, whose explorations
in the South of Spain a few years ago, as described by
themselves before the British Association in Manchester
in 1887, caused quite a sensation in scientific circles, so
extensive were their discoveries, and so enormous the

6 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

amount of objects, especially in silver, which rewarded
their excavations. Suffice it to say briefly that these
discoveries of innumerable traces of prehistoric man, his
homes and workmanship, covered the Neolithic period,
a period of transition, and a metal period. In the transi
tion period MM. Siret discovered distinct traces of the
influences of a foreign invasion, either hostile or mercan
tile and pacific, shown by the gradual admixture of
bronze with stone implements. It is instructive to
observe that together with this introduction of bronze
appears also, for the first time, the practice of cremation,
leading to the plausible conclusion that the metal and
the new practice had one and the same source. It is
also noticeable that ornaments are found only with the
inhumated bodies, and probably only with females. Of
the Third or Metal Age so rich in silver that it might
almost be called a Silver Age MM. Siret discovered no
less than fifteen entire villages, and in these villages they
were able to explore with the greatest care as many
as 1,300 burial-places. The remarkable thing is that
during this period all traces of the practice of cremation
had disappeared. The men of the period had returned
to the primeval custom of inhumation ; and, strangely
enough, the graves as a general rule were beneath the
floors of the houses themselves a custom not unknown
in other parts of the world. In four-fifths of the cases the
bodies were found in the crouching, knee-to-chin attitude
above referred to, packed in large earthen jars, some
times with a hermetically-sealed cover, sometimes
two such jars being joined mouth to mouth, and often
two bodies, generally one of either sex, in the same jar.
With the bodies, too, were found the remains of food,
such as bones of oxen, also copper axes, and quantities
of trinkets, especially in virgin silver.*

From all the facts, of which the above is a very meagre

* Mr. James McCarthy, of the Siamese Survey, informed
MM. Siret and myself, at the British Association meeting re
ferred to, that similar funeral jars are found in parts of Siam.

THE ART OF BURIAL 7

summary, Dr. Bauwens, whom I am still following,
draws two general conclusions namely (i) To the
earliest races the practice of cremation was unknown ;
(2) this practice came in with the race of the great stone-
builders, who probably were also the introducers of the
first of all known metals, bronze. The question at once
occurs, Who were these people ? Did they constitute
one race or many ? They must have been a people in
whom the passion of wandering was strongly developed,
for their structures are to be found in the Crimea,
Southern Russia, Denmark, Sweden, Holland, England,
Ireland, France, Spain, Germany, Africa, Palestine,
India. Even their path may be traced. " It is evident,"
writes Felitzin, " that the dolmen builders travelled
from the eastern to the northern shores of the Black Sea,
where the Crimea offers a similar series of buildings."
From Scandinavia, too, the dolmen followed the coast
of Western Europe to Portugal, turned back by Mar
seilles, and along the valleys of the Rhone and Saone,
eventually reached to near Berlin. Dr. Bauwens,
following in this such authorities as Fergusson, Hamard,
and d Estienne, believes that this race was no other than
that of the Kelts, or, at least, was an Aryan or Indo-
Germanic people. And the same conclusion is pretty
generally accepted for the contemporary Lake Dwellers,
whom so eminent an authority as O. Schrader finds to
be characteristically Aryan. (See his " Prehistoric An
tiquities of the Aryan Peoples," part iv., chap, xi.)
If the objection be made that these structures apparently
belong to a period considerably before the great Aryan
migration, our author answers that it is not at all
impossible that detached tribes or hordes of Aryan
wanderers, whether Keltic or otherwise, may, even
during the earliest portions of the Neolithic period, have
found their way into far distant parts of Europe, carrying
with them the custom of cremation, as well as the know
ledge of metal, to the less cultured or less gifted race*
among whom they established themselves.

8 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

II.

The thesis which underlies the whole of Dr. Bauwens
work is therefore this :

" The Aryans were the originators of cremation. All
nations of Aryan origin made use of the funeral pyre.
. . . On the other hand, cremation was unknown to
the non-Aryan races, with the exception of a few peoples
like the Japanese and Mexicans, among whom, however,
the practice never attained such dimensions as it did
with the Aryans."

It must not be thought that this theory is by any
means new. Years ago Adolphe Pictet wrote in his
" Origines Indo-Europeennes " :

" The most evident result of the researches of J. Grimm
is that, without any exception, cremation from the
remotest period had prevailed over inhumation among
the Aryan peoples. The Indians, Greeks, Romans,
Gauls, ancient Germans, Lithuanians, and the heathen
Slavs, cremated their dead with certain ceremonies,
which, in spite of their differences, offer unquestionable
traits of agreement. The Eranians alone, on account of
the great change which occurred in their religious beliefs,
early on abandoned this ancient usage. For the nations
of Europe it was Christianity that put a stop to crema
tion. This latter method of disposing of the dead was
never practised by the Hebrews, Arabs, or Moham
medans in general. Such an agreement at once leads us
to suspect a common origin dating from before the
separation of the Aryans. Indeed, although the custom
of burning the dead may be found here and there among
other races of men (e.g., Japanese and Mexicans), yet it
never attained the same extension as in the Aryan
family. The custom, as Grimm has pointed out, must
have had its beginning in the earliest times of their
pastoral life, before their departure from their nomadic
home, for it enabled them to carry with them on their
journeys the revered ashes of their dead."

THE ART OF BURIAL 9

It now becomes of importance and interest to inquire
a little more fully into the funeral customs of the Aryans
themselves. At this point I must beg to be allowed to
decline entering into the fascinating discussion regarding
the cradle-land of our Aryan ancestors, to which
notable contributions were made in this country some
years ago by Professor Sayce, Dr. Isaac Taylor, and
Professor Rendal, of University College, Liverpool, on
the one side, and by Professor Max Miiller on the other.*
The question, however, will not directly affect our present
investigation.

To return : the evidence for the prevalence of crema
tion among the earliest Aryans before their separation is
twofold from language and from custom. On the
philological side, it is curious that the first and strongest
evidence is furnished by the language of that very branch
of the Aryan family which we know to have abandoned
both cremation and inhumation from religious motives
namely, the Eranians. For the very name of the reposi
tories for their dead, which is to be found in their sacred
book, the Avesta itself, and which has survived unaltered
among their descendants up to the present day, is
dakhma, clearly referable to the well-known Aryan root
dah, to burn, and therefore originally signifying nothing
else than " a burning place." A curious analogy is
furnished by the Keltic, wherein we are told the word
adnacul, or adhnachd, signifies burial-place, whilst a
comparison with the negative adjective neph-adhnachte,
" unburnahle," shows that the original meaning of the
word also involves the idea of cremation.

The Latin funus, again, seems clearly connected with
the root dhii, appearing both in Sanskrit, and in the Latin
fumus, " smoke." The connection, again, of bustum,
signifying a tomb, with the old verb buro (still preserved
in the compound comburo) is self-evident. It is sug-

* The best summary of the controversy and the most satis
factory refutation of the theories of European origin are to be
found in several publications of the Rev. Pere van den Gheyn,
S.J., of Brussels.

io SKETCHES IN HISTORY

gested, moreover, that the Greek fivfjbfios may be con
nected with the root dM above referred to, and some
writers have seen in or^a (a mound or barrow, grave, or
gravestone, or also any mark or sign) the analogue of the
Sanskrit kshdma, burning, from the root kshd.

If we now turn to what literature and history have
preserved us of the funeral customs of the ancient civil
ized Aryan nations, especially the Hindus, Greeks, and
Romans, we shall find a superabundant amount of
material, from which we can only afford time to glean a
very few particulars.

The Rig Veda contains plentiful details of the funeral
ritual in use among the early Aryan conquerors of India.
From it we learn how the funeral pyre was built of care
fully chosen and valuable woods, especially the deva-
ddru (deodar, or divine tree). When the body, carefully
prepared, had been reverently laid upon the pyre, the
attendants thrice walked to the left around it the so-
called prdsavya rite, whose object was apparently to
drive away evil spirits. When the fire had been set to
the pile, a black cow or a black goat was brought forward
and sacrificed, and the priest placed a kidney of the
victim in each hand of the corpse, reciting meanwhile a
verse from the Veda praying for the safe journey of the
deceased in the nether world, and his protection from the
two dread hounds of Yama. At this moment the widow
stepped up to the pyre and laid herself down beside her
husband. She was not, however, in Vedic times suffered
to burn ; for she was called away in the words of a Vedic
hymn (R. V., x. 18, 8) : " Rise up, O woman ! come back
to the world of the living ! Thou art lying by one who
is dead. Thy marriage with him is at an end." The
cruel custom of " suttee," as it became called, or widow-
burning, so prevalent for centuries all over India, and
which our Government has had so much difficulty in
repressing, is an abuse of later date, and utterly repug
nant to the precepts and spirit of the most sacred of the
Indian books. Strange to say, like an inverted pyramid,

THE ART OF BURIAL n

the whole vast structure of centuries of inhuman cruelty
rests for its authority upon a single textual corruption
namely, the substitution of an n for an r in R. V., x. 18, 6
(agneh for agre). Finally, when, after the recital of
many hymns, the body had been entirely reduced to
ashes, these were carefully gathered together, and
enclosed in an urn called kumbha.

I will not weary the reader with many details about the
parallel descriptions to be found in the classical literature
of Greece and Rome. The building of the funeral pyre
as described by Homer and Virgil will occur to all, as
also the triple running round the pile :

Aurctp
rpls Trepl %aX/cet ots ffbv reuxe

Again, the slaughtering of black cattle occurs as an
incident in the funeral rites of Greeks and Romans
(e.g., " -ZEneid," v. 97, vi. 243). Instead of the kidneys
given by the Hindus, the Greeks put honey-cake in the
hands of the deceased, wherewith to satisfy Pluto s three-
headed hell-hound, Cerberus. The funeral-urns of
Greeks and Romans are too well known to need further
comment.

After speaking thus in detail of the crematory rites of
the ancient Aryan peoples, it is curious to be reminded
that in all probability, even among them, inhumation
originally preceded cremation. Not only so, but it
appears that the two rites existed side by side in Vedic
times, and such is the conclusion of no less eminent
authorities than Grimm, O. Schrader, and Zimmer.
The last-named points out that in the Rig Veda the
hymn R. V., x. 16, describes the disposal of the dead by
cremation, whilst R. V., x. 18, describes the same by
inhumation. Perhaps, as Pictet surmised, cremation
was practised chiefly for the rich and noble, whilst the

* Apollodprus of Rhodes, " Argonauts," i. 1059 (compare
" Iliad, "xxiii. 13; " Odyssey," xxiv. 68 ; Virgil, "^neid," xi. 188).

12 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

commoner folk had to be content with ordinary earth-
burial.

If we may believe the testimony of Plutarch and
^Elian, burial in the earth was the earliest method of
disposing of the dead among the Greeks. During the
Trojan War cremation seems to have become general,
but, according to the legend, Herakles was the first to
burn a body and preserve the ashes in an urn. In Homer
the heroes are cremated with great pomp and ceremony,
whilst the common warriors, as in Virgil, are merely
buried. In 888 B.C. the practice of cremation was con
demned by Lycurgus. Under Solon, in 600 B.C., burial
in the earth appears to be the ordinary Athenian custom.
According to Thucydides, the Pythagoreans committed
the remains of their deceased to the earth, and the heroes
who fell at Marathon (490 B.C.), as well as those slain at
Platsea, were also reverently committed to the earth.
In fact, the nearer we approach the Christian era, the
more abundant become the evidences that inhumation
was again steadily supplanting the practice of cremation.

With reference to the old Romans, we have the explicit
tradition preserved by Pliny " Ipsum cremare apud
Romanos non fuit veteris instituti ; terra condebantur "
(lib. vii., c. 54) a testimony confirmed by Cicero (" De
Legibus," ii. 22). In fact, the early Romans, like the
silver-workers in prehistoric Spain, actually buried their
dead beneath the hearths of their houses. It is evident,
however, that from very early times both cremation and
inhumation were practised side by side, for the Laws of
the XII. Tables contain the express sanitary regulation :
" Hominem mortuum in urbe ne sepelito neve urito."
That burial was esteemed honourable, and, indeed, pre
ferred by the noblest families during the palmy days of
the Republic, appears from the magnificent graves along
the Via Appia, wherein during our own times the entire
bodies of many of the Scipios, notably of L. Cornelius
Scipio Barbatus (Consul 298 B.C.), have been discovered
(A.D. 1870). The custom of cremation appears to have

THE ART OF BURIAL 13

been rendered popular by Sulla, who ordered the
cremation of his own body, probably to prevent its being
exhumed and dishonoured, after the manner in which
he had treated the remains of his great rival Marius.
From that time onward, and particularly under the
Empire, cremation gained the upper hand, until, as in
other parts of Europe, it was swept away by Christianity.

III.

I have above referred to the peculiar position taken up
in this matter by one of the most celebrated branches of
the Aryan family I mean the Eranians. It is true
that, as the word dakhma, already quoted, bears witness,
cremation was in common vogue among them in the
earliest times. It is also true that the Achaemenid
Kings of ancient Persia, Cyrus and his successors, were
buried in the earth. But it is likewise true that to that
branch of the Eranian people which adopted the religious
reform of Zarathushtra or Zoroaster both inhumation and
cremation were entirely abhorrent. In their dualistic
system earth and fire were sacred elements belonging to
the realm of the good principle Ahura-Mazda. Death,
on the other hand, caused the possession of the human
body by the impure demon Nacus, one of the spirits be
longing to the legions of the evil principle Angro-Mainyus.
Hence the contact of a corpse was polluting in the
highest degree, and to allow it to sully the elements of
fire or earth or water was a sacrilege of the gravest kind.
Strange indeed was the method excogitated by the
Mazdean theologians for escaping from this dilemma
the same, indeed, as that practised by their lineal
descendants, the Parsis of Bombay, at the present day.
The bodies of the deceased were exposed in such a manner
that the " four-footed or two-footed scavengers of
Ahura-Mazda " dogs, namely, and birds of prey might
consume all the soft portions of the human frame ; and
this stripping of the bones and leaving them clean^and
white was held to^be a process of purification. It is not

14 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

unlikely that the Eranians borrowed this strange custom
from some of their Turanian neighbours, for there are
still forms of it in use among some of the Mongolian
peoples, notably in the Steppes of Tibet. The rite above
described may be seen to the present day, scrupulously
observed in all its fulness, in the so-called Towers of
Silence, the dakhmas of the Parsis, outside of Bombay.
In a paper contributed in 1890 to the Babylonian and
Oriental Record, and since republished in a small pamphlet
on " The Marriage and Funeral Customs of Ancient
Persia," I venture to think that I have satisfactorily
cleared up certain difficulties surrounding the passage in
the Avesta (Vend., vi. 49-51), which contains the
authoritative directions of the legislator for the disposal
of the dead. I have there shown that, after the body
had been thus stripped of its fleshy parts, the skeleton
was to be carefully deposited in one of three kinds of
receptacles either in stone urns, or in concrete urns, or
in cloth bags. Only in case of poverty, when the above
astoddns, or bone receptacles, could not be procured,
were the bleached bones to be left exposed on the
bedding of the deceased in an elevated place.

Another of the great Aryan religions has played an
important part in influencing funeral customs in the
Eastern world. One of the most famous cremations on
record is that of Buddha, and Buddhism has always
adopted cremation as its special method of disposing of
the dead. Hence it would appear that the spread of
Buddhism has been the cause of the spread of cremation
also in Ceylon, Siam, Burma, etc. In China, however,
except in Buddhist monasteries, the custom has not
succeeded in supplanting the old Chinese rite of com
mitting the dead to Mother Earth. In fact, it may be
said that the Chinese are pre-eminently a nation of
earth-buriers, and it is well known what enormous im
portance even those who have emigrated to America
attach to the privilege of having their mortal remains
restored to their native soil.

THE ART OF BURIAL 15

A very interesting series of articles on " Ladak (or
Little Tibet) and Ladaki Buddhism," by Father Henry
Hanlon, of Leh (now Bishop Hanlon, of Uganda),
published in Illustrated Catholic Missions (vol. ix.,
1894-95), contains some exceedingly curious details of
the funeral customs of that Tibetan country. The writer
tells us that the phos-spun, or hereditary undertaker,
ties up the corpse with ropes in the crouching knee-to-
chin attitude already referred to, in as small a space as
possible. After several days of elaborate religious rites,
the corpse, shrouded in a cotton bag, is carried on the
back of the chief mourner to the cemetery, where it is
eventually burned in a kind of oven, amid ritual
chanting.

" The reading and chanting continue until the first
bone falls from the smouldering pyre ; this bone is taken
to the religious room in the house of the deceased, and
pounded into dust, which is mixed with clay and
moulded into a small image, called thsathsa. If the
deceased was wealthy, a large cenotaph chorten is
erected to receive the thsathsa. The poor deposit their
image in old cenotaphs."

The following passage is also significant :

" In districts where wood is scarce the bodies are
exposed to be devoured by eagles and ravens. Accord
ing to General Cunningham, in Greater Tibet the dead
are cut up and thrown to the dogs ; this is called a
terrestrial funeral. But when the bones are bruised
and mixed with parched corn, which is made into balls
and thrown to the dogs, this is called a celestial
funeral/ "

It will at once occur to the reader that, as we have
hinted above, these details of the funeral rites of Central
Asia probably serve to indicate whence the Eranians
borrowed many of their strange and exceptional customs
as recorded in the Avesta and subsequent literature.

But we are wandering somewhat from our subject.
Let us return for a moment to the Aryans. Among the

16 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

ancient Gauls, as with the more civilized of their sister
races, both cremation and inhumation were practised.
The same may be said of the Germans and the Scan
dinavians, but with all these, particularly with the last-
named, yet a third method was employed that of
water-burial. Sometimes, as in the case of the Visigoths
under Alaric, they buried their dead in the beds of rivers,
in order to preserve them from exhumation and desecra
tion by their enemies. In other cases water-burial was
a result of the maritime predilections of the seafaring
races. The corpse, bound round in woollen garments,
and surrounded with all kinds of ornaments and imple
ments, was laid out in a boat, and afterwards sunk out
at sea. Sometimes, again, these sepulchral boats were
buried in the earth itself. For English readers I can
recommend on this interesting subject of Scandinavian
burial the beautifully-illustrated work of Mr. Paul du
Chaillu, entitled "The Viking Age" (London, 1889;
see vol. i., chap. xix.). Boat-burial, however, is by no
means confined to the Scandinavians, but is to be found
up and down the world among the most different races.

IV.

As in so many other things, the Semitic races present
a striking contrast to their Aryan neighbours in this
question of the disposal of their dead. If the Aryans on
the whole may be called a cremating race, and probably
even the originators of cremation, the Semites are dis
tinctively a non- cremating, an earth-burying race. This
is emphatically true of their great empires in antiquity.
Modern research has shown that the Assyrian and
Babylonian Empires had their great burial-grounds in
the ancient land of Lower Chaldaea, the plain that lies
to the north of the Persian Gulf, especially at Warka and
Mugheir. Indeed, the whole region may be called a vast
cemetery, and every hill from Mugheir to the confluence
of the Tigris and Euphrates is an accumulation of graves.

THE ART OF BURIAL 17

In all these Chaldean burial-places the bodies, like those
of the prehistoric inhabitants of South- West Spain, are
enclosed in great jars of earthenware a custom, for the
rest, which is also to be found in many parts of America,
in Japan, and in Africa.

Peculiar interest, of course, attaches to the manners
and customs of the people of Israel, and it has been
maintained that cremation was not only in use, but also
was held in honour, among them. This contention is
not, however, borne out by an examination of Biblical
history or antiquity. On the contrary, the Sacred
Records show that from the time of the patriarchs
onward the practice of burial was universal. It is main
tained that the bodies of Saul and his sons were burnt
(i Kings xxxi. 12, 13). Jeremiah, too, says to Zedekiah,
" Thou shalt die in peace, and according to the burnings
of thy fathers the former kings that were before thee,
so shall they burn thee " (Jer. xxxiv. 5). But even if we
were to grant these cases of the cremation of some of the
kings, it is evident from the overwhelming testimony of
the other portions of Holy Scripture that in the vast
majority of cases the deceased of the chosen people,
especially their patriarchs, prophets, and kings, were
buried, not burned. As a matter of fact, however, in
spite of the agreement of the Vulgate with the Anglican
A.V. and R.V., the above texts are merely instances
of mistranslation. There is excellent lexicographical
authority to show that the verb tftW translated above by
" burn," really signifies here, not to cremate, but, con
structed as it is with the preposition <> in other words,
with the dative to burn incense in honour of a person,
a meaning strongly borne out by the parallel passages in
Chronicles e.g., 2 Chron. xvi. 14, " And they buried
(Asa) in his own sepulchres which he had hewn out for
himself in the city of David, and laid him in the bed
which was filled with sweet odours, and divers kinds of
spices prepared by the apothecary s art, and they made
a very great burning (nan sp) for (*?) him." It is a very

2

i8 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

strong confirmation of this view that in all these passages
the LXX. translates the verb in question by e/cXavo-av
they mourned or lamented. The testimony of written
records is supported by the numberless ancient graves
still to be seen in every part of the Holy Land, and
especially about Jerusalem, to mention only Makpelah,
the grave of the fathers, the well-known burying-place
of the kings, and the graves of the prophets in the sides
of the Mount of Olives. We are, therefore, justified in
concluding that the Jews are no exception to the general
rule that the Semites were essentially a burying, and not
a cremating, race.

We cannot now make quite as broad a statement with
reference to that other celebrated branch of the Semitic
family I mean the greatest mercantile nation of anti
quity, the Phoenicians. It has hitherto been universally
admitted that the Phoenicians never burnt, but always
buried, their dead generally, indeed, in curious coffins
of human form. However, the year after the publica
tion of Dr. Bauwens work a curious discovery was
made at Sus, in Tunis, the site of the ancient city of
Hadrumetum. It is that of a large Punic necropolis, in
which the funeral chambers, instead of containing, like
other Phoenician burial-places, entire skeletons, are filled
with large earthenware jars containing bones of men,
women, and children, all of which have been calcined,
like those found in the burial-places of the Romans, who,
as we know, practised cremation. Punic inscriptions
on several of the jars leave no doubt as to their origin.
At the same time, this discovery stands alone as a unique
exception ; and the fact that the date of the necropolis
appears to be only just anterior to the Roman domina
tion, or even contemporaneous with its commencement,
renders it highly probable that the exceptional usage is
due to Roman influence, and therefore deprives the case
of some of its importance.

I think I shall not need to say much of the next great
people of antiquity who now claim our attention. Of

THE ART OF BURIAL 19

all ancient nations, the Egyptians are certainly those
who devoted the most elaborate care to the burial of
their dead. Need I remind my readers of the universal
custom of the embalming of the bodies of both rich and
poor, an operation in the case of the former of a most
costly nature ? or need I again enter into a description
of those most gigantic of human structures, the Pyramids,
which were nothing else but the burial-places of the
Egyptian kings ? But this is not all. Not only was
embalming and burial the exclusive funeral rite of the
empire of the Pharaohs during all the long series of their
dynasties, but in the mind of the Egyptians cremation
was regarded as the greatest of dishonours, as the
cruellest of punishments that could be inflicted on a
human being a belief closely associated with the tenets
of their religion, which taught that the destruction of the
body would destroy the possibility of a future resurrec
tion (Ebers, " Aegypten," p. 334).

Neither time nor space will allow us to follow our
author in his minute and exhaustive study of the various
other peoples, civilized and uncivilized, of ancient and
modern times. We must content ourselves wth a few
exceedingly summary remarks and a selection of one or
two of the more striking or curious details.

V.

The most interesting section, I think, is that which
treats of the New World. We have already remarked
that, as in Europe, so in America, man made his appear
ance as early as the Quarternary epoch. Slight, indeed,
are his traces during the Early or Palaeolithic Age, but
when we arrive at the period of polished stone and the
introduction of metals (in America copper, not bronze),
we find the whole of the New World covered with great
structures, analogous to the great stone buildings of the
Old World. In America these are called " mounds,"
and the race who built them are known as the " Mound-

22

20 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Builders." They offer this peculiarity, that they are
generally constructed in the form of men, quadrupeds,
reptiles, or birds. They are more or less rare in South
America, but extremely numerous in the North. They
occur all along the valley of the Mississippi as far as the
Gulf of Mexico, and stretch across from Texas to Florida
and South Carolina. Their number diminishes as they
approach the Atlantic ; they are rare in the Rocky
Mountains, and scarcely to be found in British North
America. Great numbers of them were certainly
burying-places, in some of which the corpses have
evidently been flesh-stripped before inhumation. At
the time, as in Europe, although in the majority of the
mounds the bodies are found entire, yet there are occa
sional traces of the use of cremation, specially in the
island of St. Catherine, on the coast of Georgia ; but, as
we have also seen to be the case in Europe, this cremation
appears to have been introduced together with the use
of metals. Passing now to historical times, we find at
least five different methods of disposing of the dead,
which are, and have been, in vogue among the different
races of the continent. These are :

1. Inhumation, or earth-burial, by far the most
common method in all parts of the continent. This
burial is carried out either in graves or pits (the
(commonest of all e.g., Mohawks, Crees, Seminoles,
Comanches, etc.), or in towers (New Mexico, Sioux,
Apaches, etc.), in stone coffins (Tennessee, Kentucky,
Central America, etc.), in mounds (chiefly in Ohio, Illinois,
North Carolina), in wigwams (some tribes of Carolina,
Navajos of New Mexico, Arizona, etc.), or in grottos
(particularly Utah, Colorado, Calaveras in California).

2. Embalming among some tribes of Virginia, Caro
lina, and Florida, but particularly, of course, among the
Incas of ancient Peru, whose mummies have been dis
covered by thousands during the present century.
These Peruvian mummies are generally found in the
crouching knee-to-chin attitude.

THE ART OF BURIAL 21

3. A method which may be said to be characteristic of
America is what we may call " tree-burial " and " plat
form-burial." Many of the Red Skin races place their
dead in hollow trees ; others, and especially the great
Sioux race, expose them on a kind of platform fastened
to the top of trees, where they are slowly dried up or
decomposed by the sun and the elements.

4. Water-burial, though this is extremely rare, and
found only in one or two tribes.

5. Cremation. Here and there in North America the
practice of cremation is to be found among some tribes
of British Columbia and California, the Tolkotins of
Oregon, and others. Among the Tolkotins the usage
was combined with an extremely peculiar custom,
existing also among the Carriers : it is that, whilst the
ashes of the cremated body were reverently buried, the
larger bones were picked out, and placed in a bag, which
the widow was obliged to carry on her back for some
years !* But the race of cremators par excellence of the
New World were the great Aztec nation and their kindred
tribes of the mighty ancient Mexican Empire, though
here, again, cremation was reserved for the royal family,
and perhaps the nobles, inhumation being the lot of the
common people. What distinguishes these Aztec cre
mation rites from all others is the almost incredible
barbarity in which they were carried out. Innumerable
human sacrifices accompanied the incineration of the
kings. At that of Ahuitzoll, in 1487, no less than 80,400
human beings were slaughtered round the funeral pyre,
and their skulls employed for the decoration of the temple !
But these terrible massacres were only in keeping with
the other barbarous rites of the Aztec religion, which
yearly demanded the slaughter, and even the eating, of
tens of thousands of human victims.

Passing now from the New World to the Dark Con-

* This custom (which actually gave their name to the Carriers )
has now " long been abolished." See Father Morice, O.M.I.,
on " Carrier Sociology and Mythology," Transactions Royal
Society of Canada, 1892, pp. in, 112.

22 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

tinent, we must repeat what has already been stated
for other parts of the world namely, that the remains
of prehistoric man in this continent show that in
humation was the primeval custom, and that the use
of cremation made its appearance, as elsewhere, with the
introduction of metals. But it has always remained an
exceptional usage among the peoples of Africa, and so
it is at the present day. Generally speaking, Negroes,
Bantus, Kaffirs, Hottentots, Bushmen, commit the
bodies of their dead to Mother Earth. It is unfortunately
true that in some of the native kingdoms, especially of the
West Coast, the funerals of the chieftains are accompanied
with atrocities in the form of human slaughter which
well-nigh approach those of the ancient Aztecs of
Mexico. But it may be laid down as a general rule
that through the length and breadth of the African con
tinent inhumation as opposed to cremation is practically
universal.

Among the Australian tribes almost every conceivable
variety of method is employed in disposing of dead
bodies, and similar diversities exist among other peoples
of Oceania. Here, too, as in many regions of Africa,
cannibalism prevails to a terrible extent, and may
actually be reckoned as one of the current methods of the
disposal of the dead.

With regard to the East Indian Archipelago and the
adjoining regions of the Asiatic continent, it may be
remarked that wherever Buddhism has spread cremation
is in vogue ; and as Buddhism is an essentially Aryan
form of religion, we have here one more testimony to the
Aryan origin of cremation.

VI.

It will perhaps occur to my readers that, in the fore
going hasty summary of the funeral rites of the principal
peoples of the world, I have scarcely noticed many of the
customs which almost universally accompany one or the

THE ART OF BURIAL 23

other rites in both ancient and modern times. Some of
these customs may be briefly mentioned here.

1. The well-nigh universal practice among both
civilized and uncivilized peoples of burying with the
bodies of the deceased all kinds of weapons, utensils, and
ornaments, often those of a most valuable kind ; simi
larly, the placing beside the corpse various supplies of
both food and drink.

2. The extensively practised custom of burying with
the deceased, either alive or slain, his favourite horse or
hounds.

3. The analogous slaughter at the grave, or burying
alive, of the wives or slaves of the deceased, in some
instances, as we have already seen, assuming the pro
portions of a veritable massacre. It may be stated
generally that the raison d etre of the above usages has
been in all ages one and the same namely, a belief that
the disembodied spirit in the next world will require for
its happiness all those objects, animals, and attendants
to which the living man was accustomed in this world.

4. A custom found here and there among races most
widely separated, in both time and space, of eating por
tions, or the whole, of their deceased relatives or friends.
I will not here shock the reader with details of the dis
gusting practices to which this curious usage has given
rise in certain parts of both the Old and New Worlds ;
suffice it to say that it seems to have had its origin, not
in any natural cruelty or brutality, but in a widely-spread
idea that by this means the good qualities of the deceased
could be assimilated by the survivors who consumed
them.

5. 1 have more than once referred to the strange custom
of flesh-stripping, either by means of dogs and birds or
by man himself. It may be added here that in Siam
there is a strange combination of this repulsive rite with
cremation itself. I have read few more disgusting de
scriptions than that by the Catholic missionary Abbe
Chevillard, an eye-witness, in his interesting little book,

24 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

11 Siam et les Siamois " (Paris, 1889, pp. 70-72) of the
scene at the crematory, near Bangkok, where the
sapareu, or professional corpse-butcher, is busily em
ployed in slicing the fleshy parts from the corpse for the
benefit of the dogs and vultures around. Here, however,
as Siam is a Buddhist land, the fleshless bones are after
wards cremated.

One conclusion, indeed, may be drawn from all these
strange, fantastic, repugnant, or even cruel rites : they
each and all bear witness in their way to the universal
belief of man, even when most degraded, in his own
continued existence in a future life.

VII.

Let us conclude with the following brief statement of
the general results of our investigation :

1. The primeval method of disposing of the bodies of
the dead was, in all parts of the world, that of inhuma
tion, or earth-burial.

2. The custom of cremation is, relatively speaking, of
recent origin, and apparently contemporaneous with the
introduction of the use of metals.

3. There is good reason for considering cremation to
be characteristic of, if not originated by, the Aryan or
Indo-European race, and its extension to other peoples
has been chiefly due to Aryan migrations, and particu
larly to two great Aryan religions viz., Brahmanism
and Buddhism.

4. Although both language and comparative customs
show that cremation was very extensively practised by
the Aryans, even before their dispersion from their
original home, yet their own traditions in most cases
assert that inhumation was with them anterior to
cremation ; also that during the classical times of
Hindus, Greeks, and Romans, even during the palmy
days of cremation, earth-burial was in vogue at one and
the same time, and held in equal honour, with cremation.

THE ART OF BURIAL 25

In Greece we have shown historically that cremation
gradually died out, and the primitive use of burial once
more prevailed.

5. With the great civilized non- Aryan peoples of
antiquity, cremation was repugnant to both their
national customs and their religious beliefs ; and the
same may, on the whole, be fairly asserted of nearly all
the non-Aryan peoples, civilized or uncivilized, of the
present day.

BOOKS TO BE CONSULTED.

Dr. Is. BAUWENS. " Geschiedenis en Beschrijving der Lijkbe-

handeling en Rouwplechtigeden bij de meeste Volken."

Brussels : Polleunis. 1888.
O. SCHRADER. " Prehistoric Antiquities of the Aryan Peoples."

Translated by F. B. Jevons. London : Griffin. 1890.
O. SCHRADER. " Reallexicon der indogermanischen Altertums-

kunde." Strassburg : Triibner. 1901. (Especially s.v. Bestat-

tung, pp. 76-84.)
SOPHUS MULLER. " Urgeschichte Europas." Strassburg: Triibner.

1905.

(On the whole, these latest writers agree with Bauwens views.)

II

THE LOMBARDS

I.

" FOUR invading nations . . . left no enduring memorial
of their presence in Italy. The Visigoth, the Hun, the
Vandal, the Ostrogoth failed to connect their names
with even a single province or single city of the Imperial
land. What these mighty nations had failed to effect,
an obscure and savage horde from Pannonia successfully
accomplished. Coming last of all across the ridges of the
Alps, the Lombards found the venerable Mother of
Empires exhausted by all her previous conflicts, and
unable to offer any longer even the passive resistance of
despair. Hence it came to pass that where others had
but come in like a devouring flood and then vanished
away, the Lombard remained. Hence it has arisen that
he has written his name for ever on that marvel of the
munificence of Nature :

" The waveless plain of Lombardy.

" Strange indeed is the contrast between the earlier

and the later fortunes of this people, between the misty

marshes of the Elbe and the purple Apennines of Italy,

between the rude and lightly abandoned hut of the

nomadic Langobard and the unsurpassed loveliness of

the towers of Verona. From the warriors fiercer than

even the ordinary fierceness of the Germans/* what a

* Velleius Paterculus.

26

THE LOMBARDS 27

change to the pale Master of Sentences, Peter the
Lombard, intent on the endless distinctions which made
up his system of philosophy ! Nay, we may go a step
further, and by a kind of spiritual ancestry connect
London itself with the descendants of this strange and
savage people. There is a street in London bearing the
Lombard s name, trodden daily by millions of hurrying
footsteps a street the borders of which are more
precious than if it were a river with golden sands. From
the solitary Elbe pastures, occasionally roamed over by
some savage Langobardic herdsman, there reaches a
distinct historic chain of causes and effects, which con
nects these desolate moorlands with the fulness and the
whirl of London s Lombard Street."*

This eloquent passage of the distinguished historian of
Italy and her invaders may serve as both a text and an
apology for the present article. It indicates that the
subject is one of very considerable interest in itself. But
I shall hope to show, further, that it is, or ought to be, of
more special interest to English readers, involving as it
does questions of the " race philosophy " I should be
more inclined to style it " race chemistry " so popular
at the present day, and, in the present case, bring the
Lombard race into close connection with the Anglo-
Saxon. It may perhaps not be considered unbecoming
if the present writer also pleads a personal interest in
the theme, on account of the Lombard blood which he
is proud to think flows in his own veins.

The term " Italian " is commonly used to signify all
the inhabitants of the peninsula known to us geographi
cally as Italy. As a matter of fact, it thereby includes
several races which, in their origin at least, are ethno-
logically distinct. Even the casual tourist cannot fail
to be aware of the wide difference in character, as in
appearance, of the inhabitants of the North and of the
South a difference which has sometimes led, even in
recent years, to feuds of no inconsiderable bitterness

* T. Hodgkin, " Italy and her Invaders," vol. v., pp. i, 2.

28 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

between the two populations. Taking the great fertile
plain watered by the river Po and its tributaries, the
very names which it has borne in ancient and modern
times witness to the ethnological difference of the
populations which have occupied it. Under the Roman
Republic and Empire it was known as Gallia Cisalpina,
a name connecting it at once with the other Gaul
across the Alps, and indicating its Gaulish or Keltic
population. Its modern name is Lombardy, the land
of the Lombards or Langobards, a purely Germanic
name, indicative of the Germanic origin of its latest
settlers.

Now, an exactly similar story is told by the names of
the land in which we live. Anciently it was called
Britain, or the land of the Britons, a Keltic name indica
tive of a primitive Keltic population. Nowadays it is
known as England, the land of the Angles, the Germanic
name of its Germanic invaders and settlers in the fifth
century. These facts point to the conclusion that,
broadly speaking, the constituent elements of the two
races, the English and the Lombard, have been closely
akin, while both have been, to a greater or lesser degree,
welded together by a common element of Roman civiliza
tion. The analogy becomes all the more striking when
we realize, as I shall show later on, that the original
Langobardic and Anglo-Saxon tribes were, in all prob
ability, the most closely connected of all the branches
of the parent Teutonic stock.

The differences in the results of these ethnological
admixtures are, of course, evident enough, especially in
the domain of language and culture. In these islands,
cut off toto orbe from the main body of the Roman
Empire, the Roman language and civilization rapidly
died out with the extinction of the Roman dominion,
and the Teutonic speech of the invaders, in spite of all
vicissitudes, has prevailed and subsists in the modern
English, In the great plain of Northern Italy, on the
other hand, the Roman civilization and language have

THE LOMBARDS 29

in the long run prevailed in spite of all the successive
waves of Northern invaders ; and the modern inhabi
tants, with their mixed Kelto-Germanic blood and often
strikingly Keltic or Germanic features, think and speak
in a language which is purely Roman, whilst the language
of the conquering Langobards has, to an extent almost
unprecedented in history, disappeared.

After these general considerations, I purpose, following
the lead of the able historians whose works are cited
below, to summarise what history and legend have pre
served to us of the romantic story of that interesting
race, first cousins of the Angles, which has given its name
to the modern Lombardy. For this purpose we possess
two entirely different sources of evidence the testimony
of the classical Roman writers during the first six
centuries of our era, and the native legends or sagas
handed down from generation to generation of the old
Langobard tribes themselves, and preserved to us in the
(Latin) writings of their native historians or chroniclers.
The earliest Latin historian who refers to the Langobards
is Velleius Paterculus (A.D. 6). This writer, who
accompanied Tiberius in his German expedition, charac
terizes the Langobards as " gens etiam Germana feritate
ferior," and apparently locates them somewhere between
the rivers Rhine and Elbe (ii. 106). The next to mention
them is Strabo (about A.D. 20), who under the curiously
corrupted form of Lankosargi places them beyond the Elbe
v AX/3*o<? . . . KOI AajKoaapyoi, . . . vvv Se . . .
favyovres, vii., p. 42). The great historian
Tacitus (A.D. 61-117) bears testimony to their extra
ordinary bravery in spite of the fewness of their numbers,
and the courageous manner in which they were able to
hold their own amidst powerful and numerous enemies
(" Contra Langobardos paucitas nobilitat : plurimis ac
valentissimis nationibus cincti, non per obsequium sed
proeliis et periclitando tuti sunt," " Germania," xl.). The
same writer, it is worth observing, locates the Lango
bards immediately south of the Angles, and bears testi-

30 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

mony to their worship of the great Teutonic goddess
Hertha, or Mother Earth.* The geographer Ptolemy
(100-161) places the Langobards next to the Chauci,
apparently between the Elbe and the Weser, though
elsewhere he speaks of them as if they or perhaps a
branch of them were near the north bank of the Rhine.
After this last author there is a long and strange silence
among the Roman writers concerning the Langobards
of several centuries a silence which is not broken until
Peter the Patrician, under Justinian, in the sixth century,
records the rout of the Langibards (sic), together with
the Obii, on the Danube by Vindex an event the
account of which, however, it is considered he may very
likely have borrowed from a contemporary, Dio Cassius
(A.D. 165).

It will not have escaped notice that the above testi
monies of classical writers bear witness to the gradual
shifting of the habitat of the Langobards from the Baltic
shores of North Germany, close by that of the kindred
Angles, to the banks of the Danube. Such a migration
is fully borne out by the native legends, to which we
now must turn our attention.

We have the following authorities for these old Lango-
bard sagas :

i. The Origo gentis Langobardorum, prefixed to the
laws of King Rothari (668-669). 2. Abbot Secundus of
Trent, De Langobardorum gestis. This writer died
A.D. 612 ; as a young ecclesiastic, he had been an eye
witness of the Lombard invasion of Italy, and had stood
sponsor to the son of King Agilulf at Monza. His work is
unfortunately lost, but he is quoted by Paul the Deacon.
3. The Codex Gothanus, of much later date, probably
A.D. 807-810, remarkable for its extraordinarily bar
barous Latin.

* " Such were the rites with which the Angle and the Lango-
bard of the first century after Christ, the ancestors of Bede and
of Anselm, of Shakespeare and of Dante, jointly adored the
Mother of Mankind." HODGKIN, vol. v., p. 33.

THE LOMBARDS 3*

But these authorities are insignificant by the side of
the writer we have now to mention, PAUL THE DEACON,
the native Lombard historian (725-795), who may be
justly styled the Lombard Bede.

Paul, the son of Warnefrid and Theodelinda, was the
fifth in descent from Leupicris, a Lombard who, at the
invasion of 568, settled in Friuli, where or at Aquileia
Paul was born about 725. He received an excellent
education, and for some time was at the Court of the
Lombard king Ratchis. The latter abdicated in the
year 749, and became a monk at Monte Cassino. Hither
Paul followed his royal master, and here he seems to
have contracted a warm friendship with Arichis II., the
Lombard Duke of Benevento, and his wife Adelperga,
daughter of the last Lombard king, Desiderius. The
fatal year 773 saw the invasion of Charlemagne, the over
throw of Desiderius, and the destruction of the Lombard
kingdom. Among the captives carried off to Paris by
Charles was Paul s brother Arichis, to the great distress
of his wife and family. It was in order to obtain the
freedom of this brother that the monk Paul in 732
ventured upon a visit to Charlemagne, at the Prankish
Court. His great literary abilities and ready wit soon
won him, not only the favour, but even the intimate and
familiar friendship of the great Charles, who detained
him during four years at his Court. It was during this
stay that Paul came into constant intercourse with the
great Anglo-Saxon scholar Alcuin. Alcuin, it will be
remembered, the most illustrious product of the school
of York, was intellectually, though not actually, the
disciple of the great Anglo-Saxon doctor St. Bede. I
cannot but think it very likely that Alcuin may have
spoken much with Paul about Bede, the father of English
learning, and of his great work, the " History of the
English People." It seems to me more than likely that
herein Paul found the inspiration for his own great and
kindred work, the history of the sister nation of the
Lombards. For in 736 the Lombard monk returned to

32 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Italy, first to Rome and then to Monte Cassino, where he
devoted the remaining nine or ten years of his life to
various kinds of literary labour in both verse* and prose.
Chief among the latter is his invaluable " Historia
Langobardorum," as indispensable for the early history
of the Lombards as is the corresponding history of Bede
for that of their English cousins or, rather, still more
valuable as preserving the ancient sagas or legends of the
race. This work, which ends abruptly with the death
of the great king Liutprand, the Lombard Alfred, in
744, was in all probability cut short by its author s death
in or about the year 795. Like the history of Bede, that
of Paul the Deacon is distinguished by its extreme
honesty, its absence of national bitterness, and its con
sequent trustworthy character.

II.

We may now leave for a time the solid ground of
historical fact to follow the romantic legendary history
of the early Lombards, as preserved to us in the pages of
Paul and other native writers.

In the earliest times so the Lombard saga goes
there dwelt a small but warlike race in the mighty island
of Scandanan, whose name is interpreted " destruction, "f
and whose shores were not only washed by the sea, but
(owing doubtless to their flat character) were well-nigh
washed away. The people were known as the Winnili,
a name which there is little doubt signifies " warlike, "f
At last the land became too small for its inhabitants,

* It is interesting to note that Paul was the author of one of
the best known hymns in the breviary, from the initials of which
Guido d Arezzo borrowed the names for the notes of the gamut :

" Ut queant laxis resonare fibris
M*ra gestorum /amuli tuorum
Solve polluti labii reatum,

Sancte Joannes."
First Vespers of St. John Baptist, June 24.

f Cf. Gothic skathjan, English scathe, German schaden.
J " Kampflustig," zu A.-S. urinnan, Bruckner, p. 322.

THE LOMBARDS 33

whereupon the wise woman Gambara advised her two
valiant young sons, Ibor* and Aio (or Agio), to lead forth
one- third of the people, chosen by lot, to seek new homes.
The gallant young chieftains and their tiny band of
followers set forth, and came to the land called Scoringa.^
Here they had to fight for life and liberty with the terrible
Vandals, who, under their two chiefs Ambri and Assi,
held all the countries round under the terror of their
name. Summoned either to pay tribute or to fight, Ibor
and Aio determined rather to die than to soil their name
by paying tribute. The Vandals prayed for victory to
Godan (or Wodan), the Winnili to his wife Freya, and the
latter by a curious strategy succeeded in inducing her
spouse to grant victory to the brave little army of the
Winnili. It was in this battle, as the legend tells, that
the Winnili obtained their new name, by which they
were ever afterwards known. For, by Freya s advice,
all the women of the Winnili, standing in the front rank
at daybreak, let down their long hair and encircled their
faces with it, as with beards, so that Wodan, looking
upon them, exclaimed, " Who are all these long-bearded
ones ?" And ever after they were called Langobardi, or
long-beards. After their victory over the Vandals, the
Langobards moved southwards towards the land of
Mauringa.% Here they had to contend with the Assi-
pitti (perhaps the Usipetes of Caesar and Tacitus) ; but,
instead of a pitched battle between the two peoples, the
issue was eventually decided by a single combat between
two representatives, the Langobard champion being,
strange to say, a slave. This latter, having been
victorious, received freedom, not only for himself and his
offspring, but also for a large number of his fellow-
slaves. This curious circumstance would seem to denote

* Ibor is evidently the O.H.G. ebur, mod. German Eber, wild
boar. Cf. the names of the two Angle leaders Hengist and
Horsa.

t Shoreland, A.S. score ; Uferland, Bruckner.

+ Moorland, from Maur, "moor, swampy land" (Bruckner).

3

34 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

that, as with the Anglo-Saxons, the early Langobards
had a serf population in addition to the freemen.

Having thus won their right to pass through the
territory of the Mauringa, the Langobards pursued the
course of their migration to Golanda.* The succeeding
stages of their migration are said to have been the three
strangely named lands of Anthaib, Bainab, and Burgun-
daib, in all of which Bruckner supposes the word aib,
meaning gau, valley or district. The last of the three
names is clearly connected with the tribe of the Bur-
gundians, but its position must be purely conjectural.
About this time the two chieftains Ibor and Aio died,
and the Langobards, " after the manner of the nations,"
chose for themselves as their first king Agelmund, the
son of Aio, who reigned for thirty-three years.

With King Agelmund is connected the romantic
legend of his successor, Lamissio (also called Lamicho).
King Agelmund, riding out one day, came upon a pond
in which seven new-born babes, all born at one birth,
had been cast to drown by their inhuman mother.
Halting his horse, the king turned over the bodies of the
drowned children with his long spear, whereupon one
of them who was still alive put forth his hand and seized
the spear. The king, moved with pity, at once had the
babe rescued, predicting a great future for it, and handed
it over to a nurse to be carefully tended and brought up.
And so the child was given the name of Lamissio, because
drawn out of a pond, " which in their language is called
lama." The youth grew up strong and apt in war, and
on the death of his foster-father was elected by the people
as the second king of the Langobards. This king
fought and overthrew the Burgundians, by whom King
Agelmund had been defeated and slain.

Under their fifth king, Gudeoc, the Langobards
entered the fertile country of Rugiland ; and under the

* Bruckner writes this Golaida, but translates " herrliches
Haideland." The meaning, however, appears to be " good
land

THE LOMBARDS 35

seventh king, Tato, they went forth once more into " the
wide plains, which are called in barbarian language
Feld." Here they came into contact with the Heruli,
and at this point the old national saga of the Lombard
migrations, as preserved by Paul the Deacon, coalesces
with the stream of known history ; for the war between
Tato and the Heruli is recorded by Procopius, and
occurred in A.D. 511 or 512.

It is worth while inquiring what amount of historical
fact may be contained in the interesting legends summa
rised above. As Mr. Hodgkin points out, there are
considerable chronological difficulties connected with the
narrative as recorded by Paul ; for, calculating back
wards from the known date of the war with the Heruli,
the earliest migration of the Winnili would not go farther
back than about A.D. 320, whereas it is known from the
Latin writers that they must have already been on the
Baltic shores of Germany about the time of the birth of
our Lord. But, in spite of all discrepancies as regards
dates, there is every reason to believe that the legend, as
a whole, preserves to us a fairly accurate record of the
general trend of the Langobard migration. There can
be no doubt that the original home of the Winnili,
Scandanan, represents the Scandinavian peninsula,* and
its description as lying low and being well-nigh washed
away by the sea applies admirably to the low- lying
portion of Southern Sweden, with its vast system of
lakes. Again, the name Scoringa, the first home after
leaving Scandanan, clearly meaning " shoreland," is most
appropriate for the flat territory near the mouth of the
Elbe in Northern Germany, and the existence in the
Middle Ages of a tract of country on the left bank of the
Elbe called Bardengau and of the city Bardowyk is
generally admitted to point to the settlement here of

* Authorities hold that the name " Scandinavia," adopted from
Pliny, is more correctly " Scadinavia," which Mr. Bradley refers
to a Teutonic *skadino, meaning " dark." See, however, note
above, p. 32.

<>

~

36 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

the Langobards, who were often known by the abbrevi
ated name of Bardi. The next stage of the migration,
Mauringa, evidently points to a land of moors, such as
stretched along the Baltic eastward of the Elbe, perhaps
in the neighbourhood of Holstein, or still further to the
east.

It is almost impossible to suggest satisfactory positions
for the remaining stages of the migration. In all prob
ability they represent a gradual trend towards the south
east in the direction of the river Danube. Rugiland, no
doubt, is the country to the south of Moravia and north
of the Danube. The name of the " wide plains called
Feld " is evidently the ordinary Germanic word for field,
recalling that of the well-known flat district of the
" Fylde " on the coast of Lancashire. It is taken, with
great probability, to indicate some part of the great
Pusztas of Hungary, between the Danube and the Theiss.
From this region, the scene of their war with the Heruli,
the Langobards would seem to have turned westward,
until they came to the north-east borders of Italy.

In the above account of the migration I have followed
the views of Mr. Hodgkin, and, as far as I can see, the
latest writer on the subject, L. M. Hartmann, is in sub
stantial agreement with them. The very divergent and
often fanciful theories of the migration advanced by
other writers, notably Zeuss, Bluhme, Lud. Schmidt,
Westrum, and von Stolzenberg-Luttmersen, seem to me
very fairly summarised and justly criticised by Mr.
Hodgkin. It seems not improbable that traces of the
Lombards may be found in Western Germany, in West
phalia, near the Rhine, in Switzerland, and in other parts.
But, then, we must remember that it is quite possible
that detached wings of the Lombard horde may
have made their way, or been forced, in directions
different to the migration of the main body. However,
it will be remembered that, according to the native
legend itself, only one- third part of the Winnili left their
original northern home to migrate southwards. What

THE LOMBARDS 37

became of the remaining two-thirds ? Were they
absorbed into the neighbouring Germanic tribes, or did
they preserve for any length of time a separate national
existence, and perhaps migrate on their own account ?
Bruckner shows it to be probable as Dr. Latham long
ago said* that some of the Langobards who had re
mained behind in Northern Germany may have accom
panied their neighbours the Angles in their invasion of
England, and have left traces of their presence in such
place-names as Beardincgford, Bardenea, Beardeneu,
etc., in the Saxon cartularies.

It will be observed that I have taken for granted that
the national name " Langobard " later on softened in
Italy into " Lombard "f really meant " long-beard."
This is, of course, a disputed point. Koegel suggested
that it meant rather " long axe," from the barta, which is
still to be seen in our English words " halbert " and " part-
izan." But it was the spear (gar, gair), and not the battle-
axe, which was the characteristic national weapon.
Others, again, like Leonhard Schmitt (in Smith s " Dic
tionary of Geography "), prefer " longshoreman," from
bord, meaning " shore " (border). There seems absolutely
no sufficient ground for doubting the obvious etymology
embodied in the national saga, and taught long ago by
Isidore of Seville ; and all the three recent writers quoted
at the end of this article agree in the opinion that the
name means simply " long-beard." Bruckner most appro
priately points out that the god Wodan himself is called
in Old Norse " Langbarthr," " Long-beard " a most
significant fact when we remember the Langobard cult of
Wodan, and which may explain why his royal favour was
so easily won by the quaint trick of the Winnili women ! J

* "A Handbook of the English Language," London, 1873,
pp. 75-80.

t Up to the year 1000 "Langobardi " is in use ; from 1000 to
1 200 is a period of transition; after 1200 " Lombardi " t is in
ordinary use.

t See p. 33.

38 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

III.

It is not my purpose to continue the history of the
Lombard people in Italy after the close of this long
migration. I shall therefore pass but briefly over the
remainder of the story, which is familiar enough to the
readers of European history. It was in the year 568*
that, under their eleventh king, Alboin whether at the
invitation of Narses or notf the Lombards poured over
the Alps, and made their famous invasion of Italy.
Alboin, the son of Audoin which names correspond
exactly with the Anglo-Saxon ones ^Elfwyne and Edwin
is one of the most romantic figures in Lombard legend
and history. His war with the Gepidse, his slaying of
their king Cunimund, and his wooing of the latter s
daughter Rosamund, with the tragic story of the final
catastrophe of that unhappy union, have formed
favourite subjects for poet and artist. Four years after
Alboin s successful invasion of Italy, the king, in a
drunken bout, insisted upon his queen, Rosamund, drink
ing out of the goblet which, according to the barbarous
usage of the times, he had had made out of the skull of her
slaughtered father, the King of the Gepidse. To avenge
this terrible insult, the outraged queen plotted with the
King s scild-por, or shield-bearer, and foster-brother
Helmechis to bring about the assassination of her cruel
husband, her own hand to be the reward of the treachery.
The plot was successful. Rosamund and Helmechis fled
with the Lombard treasure on board a Byzantine vessel
to Ravenna. Here Rosamund presented her paramour
with a poisoned cup. Helmechis, after drinking half the

* The year also of the great defeat of the Kentish men by the
West Saxons at the Battle of Wimbledon" the first fight of
Englishmen with Englishmen on British soil," says Green (" The
Making of England," p. 117) an interesting synchronism.

f Hodgkin entirely rejects the story (vol. v., pp. 60-65) >
Hartmann also.

*+ Paul the Deacon was shown the actual goblet by King
Ratcliis two centuries later.

THE LOMBARDS 39

draught and recognising that he was poisoned, forced the
wretched woman to drink the remainder, and so the two
accomplices died together, and the tragedy " which had
begun with a cup of death at Verona, ended with a yet
deadlier death cup at Ravenna." A few years ago
Mr. Swinburne made this thrilling episode of Lom
bard history the theme of one of his most powerful
dramatic creations.* And so deep an impression did the
tragedy create upon the popular mind that traces of it
are believed by some to remain in the folk-songs of
the Lombard peasantry of the present day. I

It is desirable here to give two warnings that will tend
to prevent some misconceptions on the subject of the
Lombard influence in Italy. The one is that, as
Bruckner most carefully and fully points out, not all
traces of Germanic nomenclature, vocabulary, or custom
to be found in medieval or modern Italy are to be attri
buted to the Lombards. Other Teutonic tribes had
invaded Italy, especially Goths and Burgundians, and
the Lombards themselves were doubtless accompanied
by Teutonic allies, such as Gepidse, Rugians, Saxons,
Swabians, etc. Moreover, the Franks who overthrew the
Lombard kingdom must have left some traces of their
presence. { Hence, great discrimination must be exer
cised in sifting from the general mass of Germanic
evidences those which are really Lombardic. This
Bruckner most conscientiously does in his admirable
essay and dictionary.

* " Rosamund, Queen of the Lombards." A Tragedy.
London : Chatto and Windus, 1899.
f Thus in the popular ballad :

" Sa ve digo, dona lumbarda,
Spuseme mi, spuseme mi,
Sa ve digo, sur cavalieru,
Ajo za mari, ajo za marl,
Vostru mari, dona lumbarda,
Felu muri, felu muri."

(Comparetti e d Ancona, "Conti e raconti del Popolo It.," vol. i.,
1870.) The dialogue may be supposed to take place between
Rosamund and Helmechis. J Bruckner, pp. i, 2.

40 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

A second warning is this : The fact that the great
plain of Northern Italy bears the name of Lombardy
must not lead us to imagine that the Lombard conquest
and the Lombard influence were limited to that part of
the peninsula. On the contrary, they overspread well-
nigh the whole of Italy. The great Lombard dukedoms
of Benevento and Spoleto occupied a considerable part
of Southern and Central Italy. Tuscany and Umbria,
too, were included in the Lombard conquest. So that
the Lombard rule and the Lombard tongue held sway for
a considerable time in every part of the country. Still,
the true centre of Lombard power was always in the great
northern plain, around its capitals of Pavia and Monza,
and there probably settled the bulk of the women and
children who accompanied the invading hordes on their
great trek across the Predil Pass of the Julian Alps on
that fateful Easter Monday of 568.

The history of the Lombard kingdom from Alboin
(whose assassination took place in 572) to the defeat and
deposition of the thirtieth and last king, Desiderius, by
Charlemagne, in 774, will be found in every history of
Italy. These two centuries of the Lombard supremacy
in Italy form a record of turbulent and often savage
times, though with here and there gleams of a brighter
character. The seventeenth king, Rothari, is known
for his famous code of laws, which is interesting, not
only for its excellent legislation, so remarkably akin to
the Saxon and Scandinavian legislations, but also because
of the vast number of words and terms of the now lost
Lombard speech which it preserves to us, as well as
fragments of the old Lombard legends notably a list
of kings which it also embodies. The most illustrious
of all was, of course, the famous King Liutprand (712-
744), also famous for his code of laws, as well as for his
many kingly virtues.

It is frequently stated that Pope St. Gregory the Great
brought about the conversion of the Lombards almost at
the same time as he effected that of their Anglo-Saxon

THE LOMBARDS 4*

kinsfolk. The two cases, however, are not exactly
parallel. The Lombards, before their invasion of Italy,
had already embraced some form of Christianity, or,
rather, of Arianism. Strange to say, of the time and
place* of this conversion nothing is known, and it is
clear enough that whatever Christianity they had was of
a very superficial and skin-deep character, mixed with
much of the pagan superstition of their forefathers.
The earlier years of the Lombard dominion were there
fore marked by continual hostility between the orthodox
Italians and the rude Arian Lombards, who often cruelly
persecuted and plundered the Catholic Church, so that
we can understand Gregory the Great styling them
" nefandissimi." King Authari, the second in succession
after Alboin, however, married Theodolinda, daughter
of the Catholic Duke of Bavaria, Garibald. This re
markable woman chose for her second husband Agilulf
(590-615). It was through Queen Theodolinda, as in
England through Queen Bertha, that the great Pope
strove for many years to secure, not only peace with the
Lombards, but also their conversion to the Catholic faith.
He had the satisfaction at the end of his life, if not to
bring about the conversion of Agilulf, at least to secure
the baptism of his son Adelwald, and the gradual con
version of the Lombard people to the Catholic faith. In
this sense, therefore, he is justly styled the " Apostle of
the Lombards," as well as of the English.

Whenever a national poet shall arise for the Lombard
race, he will have at his disposal an unrivalled treasury
of romantic folk-legends to furnish forth the material of
his epic. The sagas of the wise Gambara, priestess of
the Earth, and her sons ; the great trek from Scan
dinavia ; the battle with the Vandals ; the intervention
of Wodan and Freya, and the strategy of the Winnili
womenfolk ; the slave s duel in Mauringa ; King Agel-
mund and the finding of Lamissio ; Lamissio s single
combat with the Amazon ; the story of Alboin and

* In all probability during the sojourn in Pannonia (Hungary).

42 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Cunimund ; the weird tragedy of Alboin and Rosa
mund ; the romantic wooing of Theodolinda, daughter
of Garibald, by Authari here is a wealth of legend and
legendary history such as few races can boast of, and
which any nation might be proud to own.*

IV.

It is, of course, certain that the Langobards were a
purely Germanic race ; but the interesting ethno
graphical question now arises whether they belong to
the Low German or High German division of the
Teutonic family. Eminent authorities, like Grimm,
Schmitt, Zeuss, Moller, and Much, have declared for the
opinion that they belong to the High German race an
opinion which relies chiefly upon the powerful argument
that the very numerous remnants of the Lombard
vocabulary preserved nearly all show the phonetic
alteration of consonants or Lautverschiebimg character
istic of the High German, f But, in spite of this ex
tremely weighty argument, the careful investigations
of Hodgkin, and especially Bruckner, with whom the
latest writer, L. M. Hartmann, unhesitatingly agrees,
seem conclusive of the Low German origin of the Winnili
or Langobards. The prevalence of the undoubted
Lautverschiebung in their language is satisfactorily ex
plained as a linguistic " contamination," the result of
three centuries of residence in South Germany, and close

* Bruckner, in the most ingenious manner possible, shows
that the Lombards possessed certain alliterative national ballads
embodying many of these sagas, now known to us only by Paul
the Deacon s Latin " History," and has very skilfully attempted
partially to restore some fragments (see his work, pp. 19-21).

t For example : por, in scild-por (shield-bearer) ; raub, robbery
(A.S. redf) ; pair, boar ; pahis, boy ; scuzo, shooter (cf. German
Schutze) ; tallis, dale (cf. German Thai} ; zdn, tooth (Mod. Ger.
Zahn] ; zdn, garden (Dutch tuin, Mod. Ger. Zaun] ; grap, grave
(A.S. graf, mod. Ger. Grab}, etc. Also in proper names : Alboin,
/Elfwyne ; Aripert, Herbert ; Hildeprand, Hildebrand ; Claffo,
A.S. Glappa.

THE LOMBARDS 43

contact with High German tribes. Even the second
main argument which hitherto has borne great weight
viz., that the Langobards were reckoned by Tacitus and
Ptolemy among the Suebi, and so must be generally
classed as Suabians or High Germans loses its value
from the fact, already pointed out by Much, that un
doubted Low Germans, like the Angles, were also some
times included by the Latin writers under the same
designation. The name, therefore, was either of merely
political significance, or perhaps meant simply " free
men."

But there are convincing arguments for the thoroughly
Low German character of the Langobards, and incidentally
for their close connection with the Angles and Saxons,
which I briefly summarise as follows, from the pages of
Bruckner (pp. 24-32).

1. The extraordinary similarity between the Lombard
laws, so fully preserved in the codes of Rothari and
Liutprand, and the laws of the Angles, Saxons, and
Frisians.

2. The striking analogy in both the technical and
ordinary vocabulary e.g. : (a) Legal terms : fulc-free
(A.S. folcfry), folk-free ; fulboran (A.S. fulboren) ;
selpmundius (A.S. selfmundich), " sui juris " ; warigang
(cf. O.N. sktggangr, A.S. waldgenga), stranger ; vante-
poro (A.S. vothbora), spokesman ; aid, oath ; aldius, half-
free man (A.S. elde, ylde, men), (b) Ordinary words
differing from the High German : fol (A.S. ful), beaker,
cup ; gaida (A.S. gad), goad ; traib (A.S. draft, drove,
drive ; drancus (O.S. dreng, O.N. drengr), youth ; scaf-
fardus (O.S. scapward), steward ; bdn (A.S. ben, O.N.
bon), boon, prayer.

3. The flexion in some points agrees with the Anglo-
Saxon and Old Scandinavian as against the High
German e.g., aidos, pi. of aid (" oath "), as against
H.G. Eid-e.

4. An agreement in several sagas and myths, especi
ally in the worship of Wodan and Freya. It is also

44 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

worthy of remark that the Anglo-Saxon hero Sceafa is
actually designated in the "Traveller s Song" (v. 32)
" King of the Langobards " (Sceafa [weolde] Long-
bear dum).

5. A decided parallelism in the royal genealogies ;
compare the Lombard Waccho and Claffo with the
Anglo-Saxon Wehha and Glappa.

6. Paul the Deacon had already remarked upon the
similarity of dress of the Lombards with that of the
Anglo-Saxons " qualia Anglisaxones " (H.L., iv. 22) ;
which is said, by the way, to be the earliest use in litera
ture of the name Anglo-Saxon.

7. Alboin, whilst in far-off Pannonia, appeals for help
and support to the Saxons, as to old friends (amid vetuli,
H.L., ii. 6).

The " Traveller s Song," attributed to Widsith, a well-
known Saxon poem of the sixth century, has more than
one reference to the Langobards. Besides the above
mention of Sceafa, the poet tells us of his own visit to
the Lombard King Alboin in Italy :

" Ic waes . . .
. . . mid Longbeardum . . ." (Line 159) ;

and more explicitly :

" Swylce ic waes on Eatule (Italy)
Mid Aelfwine . . . [Alboin].
Beam Eadwines" [Audoin]. (Lines 139-147.)

Almost in the style of the Vedic poets, he praises
Alboin as having the " lightest hand of mankind to work
love, most generous heart to deal out rings and bright
bracelets." In line 194 he proclaims as his patroness
" Ealhilda, Queen of Myrgingi, and daughter of Eadwin,"
who may perhaps be the Lombard Audoin.*

Bruckner thus concisely sums up the evidence for the
ethnographical position of the Lombards :

" On the ground of the above-mentioned numerous
facts we may unhesitatingly declare the Langobards to

* The ending Hilda, ilda, is common in Lombard female names.

THE LOMBARDS 45

be Ingvaeones. Moreover, we seem justified in reckoning
them in the Anglo-Frisian group, since they have the
most points of agreement in laws, vocabulary, and
legends with the Anglo-Saxons. But the fact that the
languages of these people do not show the same phonetic
changes must be explained by the migration southwards
of the Langobards before the Anglo-Frisian phonetic
laws had come into operation " (p. 32).

Many years ago Latham had come, by the same argu
ments, to the similar conclusion, that everything except
the peculiar High German phonetic character of the
Lombard glosses " points to their Angle affinity."
He adds, however, " The great complication engendered
by the High German character of the Lombard glosses
cannot for an instant be ignored," and is driven to the
expedient of supposing that these glosses are not
Lombard at all, but Bavarian.* This explanation,
however, is quite untenable in view of the great number
of Lombard proper names preserved to us in docu
ments.

The subject of the Lombard language is a fascinating
one. On the one hand, the number of Lombard words
and proper names which have been preserved is very
great ; on the other hand, the language itself has so
utterly perished that nothing beyond a single sentence of
three words and that doubtful has come down to us.
Not an inscription, not a fragment of a folk-song, a
charm, or a prayer has escaped the cataclysm. A
single pronoun is known. A single imperative of a verb,
a single preposition, are all that remain to complete our
knowledge of the accidence. Yet, out of such un
promising materials has Bruckner, with characteristic
German industry, succeeded in compiling his elaborate
work of 338 pages on " The Language of the Lombards,"
of which over 150 pages are devoted to the " grammar " !

It is not easy to determine at what date the use of this

* Dr. R. G. Latham, " A Handbook of the English Language,"

ut sup.

46 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Lombard language finally died out in Italy. Bruckner

gives evidence to show that, although the Lombard

kingdom came to an end in 774, the Lombard speech was

still spoken by the majority of the people, even under

the Franks, and that it cannot have died out entirely

before A.D. 1000 at the earliest. It has left a very few

traces in the Italian language itself, of which we may

mention the words sir ale, arrow (cf. A.S. strael) ;

aggueffare, to add to (cf. A.S. wefan, weave) ; romire,

to make a noise (A.S. hredm, noise) ; and probably some

endings such as ingo, engo, asco, atto, etc. It is not easy to

explain the absolute loss of all literary monuments, of

which some must surely have existed during the four or

five centuries of the life of the Lombard language in Italy.

We know that national songs or ballads certainly existed,

and from the dialogues of Gregory the Great we learn

of the existence among the Lombards of hymns and

incantations, whilst Paul the Deacon tells us of songs

about the valour and liberality of King Alboin, which

reminded one of the above-quoted eulogy of the Saxon

poet Widsith. This deplorable loss of an entire national

literature is the more difficult to explain, as Bruckner

tells us that the quantity of legal and other documents

of the Lombard epoch, written in Latin, is so enormous

that it is practically impossible to collect from them all

the fragments in the language in the form of glosses, etc.,

which they contain. Space would not permit me to

quote even a small percentage of the vast number of

single Lombard words which have thus been preserved,

like fossils, in these Latin documents. I merely append

in a footnote,* in addition to those already quoted, a

few of the more striking ones.

* A deling, Etheling (A.S. Athelinge) ; accar, field, acre (A.S.
CBCRY} \ anagrip, assault (Ger. Angriff) ; berg, hill (Ger. Berg) ;
braid, broad ; braida, level plain ; campio, champion ; drancus,
youth (A.S. dreng) ; faderfiu, " father-fee," dowry (A.S. fceder-
feoh) ; flasgrd, flax-gray ; gaida, spear, goad ; gtsel, witness, bail
(A.S. gisel, hostage, pledge) ; guidus, wide ; guidrigild, wergild
haist, hasty (A.S. nast) ; lagi, leg ; land, land ; lang, long

THE LOMBARDS 47

It is interesting to remark that a single signature to a
deed of the year 372 preserves to us the nominative
singular of the first personal pronoun viz., ih, I ;
whilst the solitary Lombard sentence above referred to
is the juridical formula by which a testator proclaimed
another person his heir viz., " Lid in laib," meaning
literally, " Go into (my) inheritance " (i.e., Be my heir).*

It is not only in language, however, that the Lombards
bore traces of their Germanic origin and their kinship
with the Anglo-Saxon race. We have already noticed
how their national historian Paul the Deacon, whose
testimony is always valuable owing to its undoubted
honesty, bore witness to the similarity in dress between
his own people and the Anglo-Saxons. More than this,
even physical features are eloquent in the same direction.
To the present day, in spite of all historical vicissitudes,
the Lombard race still bears strongly the evidences of its
origin. The light, often ruddy, complexion and hair,
which are still common in Lombard families (as in some
of the writer s own family), and the general physical
appearance, are strongly suggestive of kinship with the
Angle and Saxon races.

The political institutions of the Lombard invaders of
Italy tell a similar story, and remind one considerably of
the state of things in the early Saxon history of this
country. The kingship was not strictly hereditary, but
rather elective, with a loosely hereditary character.

laubia, arbour (Ger. Laube) ; laun, reward (Ger. Lohne) ; mar,
horse, mare ; marscalc, marshall ; morgingdb, dowry (Ger. Mor-
gengabe) ; nassa, net ; plovum, plough ; pul, a boil or swelling ;
scdla, scale, skull ; skilla, bell (Ger. Schelle) ; smido, smith ;
stolesazo, lit. " stool-setter," master of ceremonies ; stupla,
stubble ; thinx, " thing," assembly ; waida, meadow (Ger.
Weide) ; waldus, wood (Ger. Wald) ; wifa, whiff, whisp of straw,
etc. Bruckner s dictionary occupies 136 pages of his book.

* Lid is evidently the imperative of a verb equivalent to the
A.S. lethan, to go, the causative meaning of which is preserved
in our English " lead." Laib is the English noun " leave," in
the sense of what is left or bequeathed. We still ask in this sense
" How much did so-and-so leave ?"

48 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Hence its inherent weakness, and the " centrifugal "
character of the political state, as Mr. Hodgkin points
out. On the other hand, the line of kings presents great
legislators in Rothari and Liutprand, who remind us of
the Athelstan, Alfred, and Edward of Saxon England.

The love of liberty and the power of the public
assembly, again, seems to connect the two races. The
importance of the Thinx in Lombard public life, and its
very name, of course recall emphatically the Thing, which
all through history has been the distinguishing feature
of political life among the Scandinavian peoples, and the
name subsists to the present day as that of the Parlia
ments of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway.* Among the
Lombards the Thinx was more a judicial than a political
assembly, before which various public legal acts had to
take place, especially all transactions regarding pro
perty. The Lombard codes have even preserved in their
curious mixture of Latin and Teutonic forms the verb
thingare, with the meaning of making away property by
donation, and from this custom the word thinx came
also to mean a donation of property itself. It was also
called gairethinx, from gar or gair, spear, evidently the
national weapon of the Lombards, which enters so
continually into Lombard proper names, among which
it may be interesting to note the ancient royal name
Garibald, the modern surname Garibaldi, and probably
the second part of the family surname of Dante, Ali-
gherius. Such legal terms already referred to as guidri-
gild (also wirigild), " weregild " ; faida, blood-feud; fio
or fihu, money ; morgincap, the A.S. morgengifa,
faderfio, and many others, show how extensive were the
points of contact between the two legislations.

Finally, the Lombard temperament and character
have preserved to the present day the clear traces of their

* So the Landsthing and Folkething of Denmark, the pro
vincial Landsting of Sweden, and the Storthing (comprising
Lagthing and Odelsthing) of Norway. So, too, the All-Thing
of ancient Iceland, and the Tynwald (Thing-vallr) of the Isle
of Man.

THE LOMBARDS 49

northern origin and kinship. The dolce far niente which
characterizes the Southern Italian has never found place
in the character of the steady and industrious Lombard
peasant or artisan. During the Middle Ages the
Lombard influence in arts and commerce was widespread
throughout Europe. The " Magistri Comacini," the
famous master-builders who went forth from the shores
of the lake of Como, were the first creators of that power
ful and solid Christian architecture which, from the
eighth to the tenth century, was perfected in Lombardy
itself, and from the close of the tenth began to spread
throughout Europe under the names of Romanic and
Norman. In another direction, the Lombard Street of
London, as remarked by many historians, bears eloquent
testimony to the part played by Lombard merchants
and money-lenders in the early days of English trade.

The intellectual gifts of the Lombard race may be
gathered from a few of the great names of the Middle
Ages, whose etymology at once proclaims their origin,
among which it may be sufficient to quote Lanfranc,
Anselm, Peter " the Lombard," and perhaps, as already
mentioned, Dante Alighieri.

In later times the talent and ingenuity, as well as the
enterprise, of the people of Lombard blood have been
shown in the important part they have played in
adapting to practical use, and in popularizing throughout
Europe, the discoveries of physical science which had
their birth in Italy from the fifteenth to the nineteenth
centuries. In this way the modern Lombards have
played no inconsiderable part, not only in popularizing
science, but also in advancing scientific research during
the past few centuries. On this topic I may quote an
interesting passage from a popular writer of the beginning
of the last century. Speaking of the people of the pro
vince of Como, perhaps the most thoroughly Lombard
of all parts of Italy, he says :

" The inhabitants of these places have devoted them
selves principally to the manufacture of barometers,

4

50 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

thermometers, and other useful instruments, which have
at different periods originated in philosophical dis
coveries and improvements in the knowledge of physics.
These simple mountaineers have shown a remarkable
degree of intelligence in these matters, and an aptitude to
comprehend and imitate machines and instruments used
in the natural sciences as soon as they have been in
vented. With this branch of industry they not merely
emigrate to all parts of Italy, but to France, England,
Germany, Russia, to every part of Europe, whilst some
have even crossed the Atlantic, both to North and South
America. The emigrant Comaschi have served to
familiarize even the poor and lowly with the discoveries
of physics and useful inventions. Penetrating into one
country after another, as they have long been doing,
they may be considered as retailers and propagators of
science."*

The modern Lombardy, again, is a land of textile
industries. The province of Como alone contains 78*6
per cent, of the total number of spindles, and 50 per cent,
of the weaving of the Italian silk trade. Biella, again, is
the centre of the woollen and cotton textile trades, and
Bergamo that of the finer manufactures. Indeed, the
great development of the textile industries during the
past few years, especially in Lombardy, has been of so
remarkable a character, that an English observer in 1881,
commenting upon the great growth of cotton manufac
ture, remarked upon the interesting fact that he found at
Modrone a descendant of the illustrious and warlike
Milanese family of the Visconti engaged in the peaceful
occupation of cotton-spinning.

In spite, therefore, of the large admixture of other
bloods, and the profound changes, political and social,
which the race has undergone in the course of centuries ;
in spite, too, of the total and absolute loss, well-nigh
nine centuries ago, of their national speech ; and in
spite of their linguistic and cultural absorption by the
* Penny Magazine, 1833, PP- 61, 62.

THE LOMBARDS 51

Italian elements of the land in which they finally settled,
I feel justified in maintaining that the Lombards
still form a real nation, and still preserve notjmerely
their ancient name, but also a very large propor
tion of those physical, intellectual, and ethical qualities
which characterize them as the real descendants of the
brave little Teutonic tribe of the Winnili or Langobards,
who in the early days of the Christian era set forth
on their long migration from Southern Scandinavia
towards their final home in the rich plain of Cisalpine
Gaul. Nor do I think it too fanciful to hold, not only
that the original Langobards were ethnologically the
first cousins of the Angles, but also that their final
settlement in a Keltic land, and their consequent absorp
tion of Keltic elements, have ended in producing a type
which has much in common with that resulting from the
like conquest of Keltic Britain by the Germanic tribes
of the Saxons and Angles.

BOOKS TO BE CONSULTED.

THOMAS HODGKIN. " Italy and her Invaders." Vols. v.,

vi. : The Lombard Invasion The Lombard Kingdom.

Oxford : The Clarendon Press, 1895.
LUDO MORITZ HARTMANN. " Geschichte Italiens im Mittelalter."

II. Band, I. Heft : Romer und Langobarden. Leipzig :

Wiegand s Verlag, 1900.
WILHELM BRUCKNER. " Die Sprache der Langobarden." Strass-

burg : Triibner, 1895.

42

Ill

THE ENGLISH POPE

" THE career of the only Englishman who has ever worn
the triple crown* affords ample scope both for the
picturesque and the scientific historian. There is no
more striking illustration of the openings which the
Medieval Church gave to humble worth and ability than
the life of the poor Hertfordshire lad who, leaving
England almost penniless, came to reorganize the Scan
dinavian Church, to beard the mightiest monarch of
Western Europe since Charles the Great, and himself to
dispose of kingdoms."!

These words of a non-Catholic writer seem to me
worthily and fittingly to summarize the remarkable
history of the only English Pope. The story of his life
is one of which all English Catholics may well be proud,
and it would seem but natural that it should be familiar
to every Catholic child in this country. Strange to say,
this does not seem to be the case. It may be doubted
whether one out of a hundred of the children in our
Catholic schools could tell, if asked, the name of the
English Pope, and I suspect that but few of even our
educated Catholics could give any adequate account of
his career. It is at least curious that what interest has
been taken in Pope Adrian IV. by Englishmen has been

* To be quite accurate, this is a misnomer. The tiara in
Adrian IV. s time had not yet assumed the three crowns, as his
portraits show.

f Manchester Guardian, December, 1896.

52

THE ENGLISH POPE 53

chiefly on the part of non- Catholics. The largest and
most elaborate biography of him is the sumptuous
volume published within the last ten years by a High
Church layman ;* the article " Adrian IV." in the
" Dictionary of National Biography " was from the pen
of the late Bishop of London, Dr. Mandell Creighton.
On our side, we have nothing to show but a small,
popular, historical sketch of little over a hundred pages,
by Richard Raby, published as far back as 1849. ^ * s
true that in Ireland much more attention has been
devoted to Pope Adrian, but this is exclusively owing to
the hot controversy concerning his much-disputed Bull
to Henry II. ; and, indeed, the interest in the doings of
the English Pope has been strictly limited to this one
phase of his policy. It is not easy to account for the
comparative neglect into which the memory of this really
great Englishman and great Pope has fallen amongst us.
It is certainly not the fault of ecclesiastical historians,
for all the great Continental writers on Church history,
from Adrian s own time to our own, have done full
justice to the greatness of this remarkable Pontiff one
of the most remarkable who has ever occupied the See of
Peter. It does not, therefore, appear to me to be alto
gether superfluous, even though nothing new be left to
write about him, at least to condense in popular form a
summary of what is to be found in the various writers
above referred to, and in some other historical sources.

There is another reason why it seems desirable to
make an attempt at popularizing among our English
Catholics a knowledge of the life of the English Pope.
The story always appears to me one of the most essen-

* Mr. Tarleton s handsome quarto, with its fine illustrations
and accumulation of material, is an indispensable book ; but
at the same time it must be admitted that its inaccuracy of detail
(spelling, especially Latin, dates, figures, quotations, etc.) is
simply phenomenal, and most irritating to the reader. The
present article is based chiefly on the books mentioned at the
end. There is also a " Memoir of the Life of Adrian IV.," by
E. Trollope (London, 1857). A good bibliography is to be found
at the end of Tarleton.

54 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

tially romantic and dramatic that has come down to us
from the Middle Ages. It is well-nigh the most striking
commentary which history has preserved of the words of
the Psalmist : " The Lord is high above all nations, and
His glory above the heavens. Who is the Lord our God,
Who dwelleth on high, and looketh down on the low
things in heaven and on earth ? Raising up the needy
from the earth, and lifting up the poor from the dung
hill, that He may place him with princes, with the
princes of His people " (Ps. cxii. 4-8). More than this,
it is a career which, as hinted in the quotation with which
I began, contains a distinctly practical lesson for us to-day.
The life-story of Nicholas Breakspeare always presents
itself to me in the form of a drama, whose successive acts
rise on a scale of interest and grandeur worthy of the
pen of a Shakespeare. For brevity s sake, as well as
for the better order of the narrative, I will try and
present the story in these successive acts.

I. THE POOR SCHOLAR.

The first act, then, opens in rural England in the very
last year or years of the eleventh century.

" We find ourselves at the beginning of the reign of
Henry I. Men just emerging from middle age were
living who had fought in defence of Saxon England
against the Conqueror, or who had helped in the Norman
army to win for him this island kingdom. . . . The
year uoo may fairly be taken as marking the time when
conquerors and conquered had commenced to settle
down together. The rising generation could not remem
ber the catastrophe of Hastings, and mixed unions were
beginning to bear fruit in producing the ancestors of the
(English) race of to-day. . . . Breakspeare, therefore,
as a boy lived in a time of quietness between two stormy
periods of history the one before his time, the other
after he had left the country."*

* Tarleton, " Nicholas Breakspeare," pp. 21-23.

THE ENGLISH POPE 55

The scene is laid in the rich and beautiful country
around and under the sway of the great Benedictine
abbey of St. Albans. Among the dependencies of the
abbey was the village of Abbots Langley, just north of
Watford. According to tradition, Nicholas Breakspeare
was born in this village. Through the kindness of Mr.
T. Mewburn Crook, of the Manchester Municipal School
of Art, I have obtained two drawings of the old house in
this parish, locally known as " Breakspeare s." In a
letter dated June 17, 1898, Mr. T. Armstrong, a local
resident, writes as follows :

" The building on the outskirts of the hamlet of
Bedmond, in the parish of Abbots Langley, which is
called * Breakspeare s/ is held to be the place where
Adrian IV. was born. It is known that he was born in
the parish, and I think the tradition with regard to this
particular spot may be accepted. The building is of
brick, and is now divided into two or three cottage
dwellings. It is not probable that any part of it is of
the date of the Pope s birth, though portions of the
interior seem to be older than the outside walls, which
are comparatively modern. Parts of my own house in
Abbots Langley are, no doubt, of great antiquity, but the
oldest of them as reconstructed are not earlier than
Tudor times. Houses, like everything else, decay and
fall to pieces, and often the old material is partially used
in the reconstruction. As I thought local tradition
could be relied on, and that Nicholas Brakespeare was
born in a house standing on the spot to which his name
has been given, I had a very pretty water-colour made
by a clever artist living in the neighbourhood, in which
the group of houses and the surrounding landscape were
represented, and this I sent to Rome, to be placed, with
the consent of the Pope,* in that part of the Vatican
where documents relating to the lives of his predecessors
are preserved. It was presented by a friend of mine, a
Monsignore, who told me that His Holiness was much
* Leo XIII.

56 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

pleased, and proposed to keep the drawing in his private
apartment."

Although this house, on the spot where Nicholas, the
son of Robert Breakspeare, was born, seems to be a some
what substantial dwelling, and although there is evidence
that down to the middle of the fifteenth century the
Breakspeares were a decidedly respectable family, yet
it is undoubted that Nicholas passed his boyhood in
extreme poverty. His father, Robert, eventually
became a lay-brother in the Monastery of St. Albans
whilst Nicholas was still a boy according to some, after
the death of his wife, though another well-known account
represents Adrian IV. s mother as surviving that Pontiff,
and being in great indigence at the time of his death.
Be this as it may, it appears certain that the lad Nicholas
was himself engaged for a time in servile work at the
abbey, and that, in spite of his great talents, he was
rejected by Abbot Richard, whether on account of his
youth or of his poverty or of his father s position, when
he tried to gain admittance into the monastery with the
hope of eventually becoming a monk. Bitterly dis
appointed, and in a state of utter destitution, the high-
spirited and indomitable Hertfordshire lad set out on
foot to seek his fortunes in more congenial surroundings.
Full of ardour for study, he turned his steps towards
France.

" He worked his way probably through London and
down the high road through Kent that historic route
which has been the main thoroughfare of so many
travellers to and from the Metropolis past Rochester
and Canterbury, to Dover, from whence he obtained
a passage over the narrow seas, possibly in the very
same year when the Blanche Nef was wrecked on the
treacherous rocks off Barfleur, and the brilliant company
surrounding Prince William, together with that unfor
tunate son of King Henry, were drowned."*
On his safe arrival in France, young Nicholas devoted
* Tarleton, pp. 19, 20.

THE ENGLISH POPE 57

himself with great ardour to study at first in Paris,
then the most famous European seat of learning.*
But after a few years he quitted Paris about 1125
and gradually worked and begged his way south
wards across the Rhone to Aries, where he again fre
quented, with great diligence and success, the celebrated
schools of that city. An interesting question here arises
as to the connection of Nicholas, during these Wander-
jahre as a poor scholar, with the Order of the Norbertines
or Premonstratensians. I am indebted to the Right
Rev. Abbot Geudens, C.R.P., of Corpus Christi Priory,
for a very full statement of the Norbertine tradition on
this subject. He has forwarded me a copy of the note
which Abbot Georg Lienhardt, of Roggenburg (Suabia),
adds to his brief notice of Pope Adrian IV. in his
" Auctarium Ephemeridum Praemonstratensium," under
the date September I. The following is a translation of
the passage :

" That the blessed Hadrian was once, at least for a time,
an alumnus of our Order he himself testifies in a Bull
prefixed to our statutes, where he thus speaks in com
mendation of our white institute : Mindful how your
institute and Order, of which we were once an alumnus,
brilliant with abundant splendour of merits and fragrant
with the grace of sanctity, hath extended its branches
from sea to sea. . . . Mention of this Bull is also made
by Petrus Waghenare ( De Elogiis Sancti Norberti
ejusque Ordinis/ p. 445), Ernestus Reubner, in his
( Chronicon Gradicense (cap. iv., p. 23), and other his
torians of our Order, both ancient and modern. The
authenticity of the Bull containing the above words was
always held as quite certain and indisputable by the most
illustrious annalist of our Order, f a most perspicacious

* A chronicle of the Irish monks at Ratisbon, quoted by
Lanigan (vol. i., p. 155), contains a tradition that one of Break-
speare s teachers in Paris was an Irish monk named Marianus,
of whom he afterwards spoke with great affection when he had
become Pope.

f Abbot Charles Louis Hugo.

58 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

historian and skilled critic, in the third MS. volume of
his Annals, p. 247. He quotes in the margin Chrysos-
tom Van de Steere, Peter Waghenare, and Bernard a
Sancto Leone, and draws the following conclusion as
from certain premises : That blessed Hadrian was
originally a professed member of the Premonstratensian
Order, and that the above-mentioned Pontiff by the
word alumnus meant exactly what is understood by the
term professus.

The learned writer goes on to show that Nicholas
passed some years in France before his entry (to be
mentioned later on) into the Monastery of St. Rufus,
and argues at some length that in the interval he studied
in some Norbertine monastery, and " saltern aliquamdiu
sub stipendiis Norbertinis militaverit." He further
quotes again the annalist Hugo to the effect that the
profession of Nicholas in the Order, and his quitting it
after his profession, was an old tradition of the Order
confirmed by " documents existing at Prague, Furnes,
Antwerp, and in Spain."* The great authority of
Abbot Hugo,| f course, makes his opinion of unusual
weight ; yet I must confess that so far as it is based upon
the words of Pope Adrian s Bull prefixed to the statutes
of the Order, it does not appear to me to be conclusive.
The use of the word alumnus, even accepting the Bull
as genuine, can surely mean little more than that
Nicholas was for a time a pupil in one of the houses

* " Beatum Hadrianum vere apud nostros professum et post
emissam professionem inde egressum fuisse atque a praedeces-
soribus veteris sevi acceptam esse traditionem quam exstantia
Pragae, Parci, Furnis, Antverpiae, Hispaniae monumenta con-
nrmant."

f Charles Louis Hugo (who died August 2, 1739) was Abbot
of Etwal, and afterwards Bishop of Ptolemais. He was his
toriographer to the Duke of Lorraine, and is considered as a
most accurate and critical historian, well acquainted with his
sources. " What he says," writes Abbot Geudens, " may be
considered above criticism." By order of the General Chapter
in 1717, held under Claudius Lucas, all the ancient documents
from the monasteries of the whole Order were transmitted to
him for the compilation of his annals.

THE ENGLISH POPE 59

in the Premonstratensians probably, indeed, a poor
scholar maintained by their hospitality or alms a most
likely supposition.* But if the tradition be really con
firmed by other documents referred to by Abbot Hugo,
and independent of the Bull, then the claim of the
Norbertine writers would be substantiated. As far as
I know, these documents have not been published ; but
Hugo, it must be admitted, writes as if he had seen them.

In any case, then, we are safe in concluding that
during his wanderings as a fahrender Schiller in France
Nicholas was in all probability under the influence and
actual care of the White Canons of St. Norbert, and
thus was very likely deeply indebted to them for
his subsequent fame as a scholar and success as a
Churchman.

After a short stay at Aries, we next find Nicholas
wending his way northward to Avignon, where he sought
and obtained admission, at first in a menial position, in
the abbey of the Canons Regular of St. Rufus (Saint-
Ruf), whose ruins are still visible near Avignon. These
Canons Regular must not be confounded with the Canons
Regular of St. Norbert, of whom we have been speaking ;
indeed, the Abbey of St. Rufus dates from a century
before St. Norbert s own time. The Order took its rise
early in the eleventh century in a secession from the
cathedral church of Avignon, which was served by
canons living in common, but who had become relaxed.
Bonanni (in his " Ordinum Religiosorum Catalogus ")
gives A.D. 1000, and Helyot (in his " Ordres Monas-
tiques ") 1039, as tne date of this event. St. Rufus
became the mother house of an independent congregation
of Canons Regular, which had many houses in France
and other countries, and even sent canons into Patras
and other Eastern churches maintaining the Latin

* It is of some importance to note that St. Norbert founded
his Order at Premontre only in 1 1 20, about the very year of
Nicholas s arrival in France, and that it received Papal confirma
tion only in 1126.

60 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

rite.* These Canons Regular no doubt followed the rule
of St. Augustine, which was, of course, the rule also
adopted by St. Norbert in the foundation of his Order
of Premontre in 1120, almost in the very year when
Nicholas Breakspeare passed into France.

It would appear that the poor English scholar waited
for two or three years in his humble capacity of a lay-
brother at the Abbey of St. Rufus, at the end of which
time the canons, won by his docility, learning, and
personal charms of character, finally admitted him to
profession in their Order. Thus, the rejected postulant
of St. Albans finally, by his steadfast perseverance,
industry, and steady determination, reached the goal
upon which his hopes had been fixed from boyhood.
With this happy consummation the first act of his
dramatic life that of the poor scholar fittingly closes.

II. THE ABBOT. f

The great talents and sterling merits of the young
English monk were not very long in leading to the first
step of promotion in his rapid career. In 1137, on the
death of Abbot William II., Nicholas Breakspeare was
unanimously elected as his successor. But with this
new dignity trials very soon came. It would appear that
some relaxation had crept into the house, and that the
firmness of the new Abbot in correcting abuses very soon

* I am indebted for these facts about the Abbey of St. Rufus
to Miss Speakman, M.A., of the Victoria University, who adds :
" The dress, too, as given by these authors, is different from the
Norbertine, although both are white. The canons of St. Rufus
wear a sort of sash over one shoulder, and tied at the opposite
side, Scotch fashion." The Abbey of St. Rufus was destroyed
by the Calvinists in 1562.

f In an anonymous article of the Dublin Review for April,
1875, Nicholas Breakspeare is referred to as " O.S.B., Abbot of
St. Albans " (p. 258, note). It would be difficult to compress
more errors in a single phrase (except a recent statement of the
Times newspaper that the only English Pope was Adrian VI.,
who lived in the reign of Henry VIII. !).

THE ENGLISH POPE 61

led the monks to repent of their election of the ex-lay-
brother to be their superior.

" But the man who had passed through the great
lesson of learning to obey was now to show them that he
had also learnt to command. If they thought that the
modest, unassuming, and compliant brother was going
to rule them with a gentle hand, and tolerate any slack
ness in the hard duties imposed on them by their solemn
vows, they were mistaken. Breakspeare showed imme
diately that power of command which comes at once
when a man of strong will, rigid principle, and knowledge
of mankind is suddenly placed in a position of responsi
bility. The more heavy that responsibility is, the
better do such men rise to it. The easy ways into which
the monks had gradually drifted were stopped, the
rigid rules of St. Augustine put in force, and, by
degrees, those men who had been unanimous in placing
him over their abbey began to murmur among them
selves."*

The consequence was a serious mutiny in the monas
tery, which culminated in two successive appeals to
Rome, carried by Abbot Breakspeare himself and a
deputation of the hostile monks to present their case
against him. The Pontiff at the time was the celebrated
Eugenius III., the disciple and favourite spiritual son of
the great St. Bernard, who, to his own dismay, had just
been thrust into his sublime office from the position of a
humble monk. At the first deputation the Pope, with
his wonted tact, succeeded in effecting a reconciliation
between the Abbot and his unruly subjects, and the
litigants returned home reconciled to each other. But
very shortly probably within a year the disaffection
broke out worse than ever. The second appeal to the
Holy See, apparently in 1146, had a very different ending.
The Pope answered the complaints of the monks with
some severity. " I know, brethren, where the seat of
Satan lieth ; I know what has stirred up this tempest
* Tarleton, p. 40.

62 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

among you. Depart. Choose for yourselves one with
whom you can be, or rather are minded to be, at peace ;
for this one shall no longer be a burden to you." The
canons of St. Rufus departed, and Pope Eugenius
retained the ex-Abbot at his own Court. The startling
and dramatic sequel is eloquent testimony to the keen
penetration of character and promptitude of action of
the Cistercian Pope ; for, almost immediately, he raised
Nicholas at one bound to well-nigh the highest dignity
which it was in his power to bestow, creating him
straightway one of the six Cardinal-Bishops,* with the
suburbican title of Bishop of Albano.

This sudden elevation of the once poor and obscure
scholar and lay-brother to a rank only second to that
of the Pope himself was sufficient to have turned a head
less strong than that of Nicholas. It is not a little
remarkable to observe how, in the providence of God, the
rejection of the penniless postulant by the Abbot of
St. Albans led to his becoming himself Abbot of the
Canons Regular at Avignon ; and the casting off of the
English Abbot by his unruly subjects led at once to his
creation as Cardinal and Bishop. With this striking
change of fortune ends the chapter of Nicholas s life as
monk and Abbot.

III. THE CARDINAL LEGATE.

From his creation as Cardinal in 1146 to the year 1152
we know practically nothing of Breakspeare s life. Mr,
Tarleton surmises not, indeed, without some probability,
though I fancy with little or no evidence that Cardinal
Breakspeare may have accompanied Pope Eugenius III.
to Paris in 1147, when the Pope went to give the cross
to King Louis VII. on the eve of the second Crusade.

* Nicholas Breakspeare was thus the second English Cardinal.
The first had been Robert Pulleyn, Archdeacon of Rochester,
created by Lucius II. in 1144. He died in 1150. Cardinal
Vaughan was the thirty-fourth English Cardinal in succession
(see Dudley Baxter, " England s Cardinals ").

THE ENGLISH POPE 63

Be this as it may, in the year 1152 Nicholas was called
upon to execute the first great act of ecclesiastical
statesmanship for which his after-career was to be so
famous. In that year Eugenius III. appointed him
Apostolic Legate to the three Scandinavian kingdoms
of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway. Whatever Scan
dinavian history we open, we shall find the name of
Nicholas Breakspeare written large in the annals of those
Norse kingdoms. The business for which the Legate was
despatched to the Far North was connected with the
ecclesiastical government of the three kingdoms, which
up to 1 1 02 had all been subject to the Metropolitan See
of Hamburg. In that year Pope Paschal II., after long
negotiations, had freed the Scandinavian countries from
their subjection to Hamburg, and erected the Metro
politan See of Lund in Denmark. But this arrangement
not unnaturally led to some jealousy between the three
kingdoms, which, by the middle of the twelfth century,
had culminated in a strong movement for ecclesiastical
home rule, perhaps stimulated by the action of
Eugenius III. in granting Ireland its four archiepiscopal
sees just before. Ambassadors from the Kings of
Sweden and Norway arrived in Rome, begging for the
erection of such metropolitan sees in their countries.
It was in reply to this request that Breakspeare was
sent on his famous legation. On this journey he passed
through England,* from the east coast of which he sailed
for Norway, where he landed on July 19, 1152. On his
arrival, the Cardinal-Legate found himself face to face
with a much more extensive and serious task than that
of merely settling the ecclesiastical government of the
country. He found the latter in a state of great political

* Mr. Tarleton s attempt (pp. 55, 56) to trace the footsteps
of his hero during his brief visit to his native country, by a few
place-names containing that of Breakspeare in two or three
counties, appears to me preposterous. There is surely a much
more obvious and simple explanation for the existence of the
name, which need not have had any direct connection with Pope
Adrian.

64 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

confusion, the royal power being divided between the
three sons of the murdered King Harald Sigurd, Inge
(sumamed Crookback), and Eystein of whom only
Inge seems to have been a really honourable man. The
crimes of the other two had brought about a state of
civil war, and the strong-minded English Cardinal,
before turning his attention to ecclesiastical affairs,
insisted upon settling these internecine feuds. His
strong and wise efforts were crowned with success. He
inflicted canonical censures upon the two criminal
Princes, and finally succeeded in restoring peace to the
country. His next step was to erect a metropolitan see
for Norway, which he fixed at Nidaros (the modern
Trondhjem), in the cathedral of which city repose the
bones of King St. Olaf. He created John, Bishop of
Stavanger, Metropolitan, and conferred upon him the
pallium, subjecting to the jurisdiction of the new
province, not only Norway, but also Iceland, Greenland,
the Faroe Islands, the Orkneys, the Shetlands, the
Hebrides, and the Isle of Man, detaching the last three
from the province of York. But his activity did not end
here. He thoroughly reformed the Norwegian Church,
swept it of abuses and of many heathen practices which
had been allowed to creep in. He also introduced the
payment of Peter s Pence.

At the request of the Norwegian people, Cardinal
Breakspeare even introduced many civil reforms
secured the public peace by causing a law to be passed
forbidding the carrying of arms by private persons, and
even limiting the King s bodyguard to twelve. Great was
the gratitude of the Norse people. Their national
historian, Snorro, relates that no foreigner ever came to
Norway who was so honoured, or whose memory is so
cherished, as Nicholas Breakspeare, and that after his
death he was honoured by the nation as a saint. It is
pleasing to add that during his brief pontificate Adrian
maintained the most friendly relations with Norway,
and sent thither English architects and artists to

THE ENGLISH POPE 65

build the cathedral of Hammer, which See he had
founded.

From Norway Nicholas departed, amid the lamenta
tions of the people, for Sweden, where he was received
with all honour, but where he found himself face to face
with difficulties which taxed all his diplomacy. The
two rival provinces of Sweden and Gothland both con
tended for the honour of the archiepiscopal see, and in
spite of the Synod of Linkoping, which he summoned, no
agreement could be come to. Wisely reserving his own
decision, which was to give Sweden no metropolitan see
at all, the Cardinal now passed on to Denmark. Here
again he had to employ no little diplomacy, for the
Archbishop of Lund, Eskil, was not unnaturally ag
grieved at the detachment from his jurisdiction of the
province of Norway, though he received the Legate with
all pomp and honour. Breakspeare propitiated the
Archbishop by confirming him in the title of Primate of
all Sweden, and granting him the right of consecrating
and investing with the pallium the new Archbishops of
Sweden, whenever the affairs of that Church should be
settled. He might now have looked upon his long and
difficult mission as successfully accomplished, but he
was once more called upon to intervene in a serious
international dispute between Sweden and Denmark,
caused by the wicked conduct of Johan, son of King
Sverker of Sweden. The Cardinal used all his influence
to avert the threatened war between the two countries,
giving the wisest advice to the Danish King. His
efforts, indeed, were in vain, but the disastrous results
of the ensuing war abundantly justified the wisdom of
his counsels.

During its progress the Cardinal Legate left Scandi
navia, and returned to Rome. Among the qualifications
which had so eminently fitted him for his Scandinavian
legation, over and above his natural talents and diplo
matic skill, we must probably reckon also his linguistic
attainments, including apparently a knowledge of the

5

66 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Scandinavian languages ; for among the literary
works attributed to him by Pagi are said to have been,
not only an account of his mission to the North (" De
Legatione Sua "), but also catechisms of Christian
doctrine for the Swedes and Norwegians. All these
works are unfortunately lost.

IV. THE SOVEREIGN OF ROME.

Cardinal Breakspeare, on his return to the Eternal
City in the early part of 1154, found his great friend and
patron, Pope Eugenius III., dead, and Anastasius IV.,
already in his ninetieth year, reigning in his place. On
December 2 of the same year the aged Pontiff died, after
a brief reign of seventeen months. The day after his
death the Cardinals met in conclave at St. Peter s, and
immediately, with unanimous voice, elected as his suc
cessor the English Cardinal, who took the name of
Adrian IV. He tried to refuse the office, but clergy and
laity alike, not heeding his remonstrances, cried out :
" Papam Adrianum a Deo electum !" a striking testi
mony to the unanimity of the choice.

" So at last the humble Englishman, the poor student,
the modest monk, Abbot, Bishop, Cardinal, and mis
sionary, was called to occupy the position of the greatest
and most fearful responsibility upon the earth of those
days. What a moment ! What a life ! Thirty years
from poverty to Pope ! And what a vista opened out
before him ! At this age he might reasonably hope for
twenty or thirty years of power, and if he lived as long
as his predecessor, forty years."*

Such was the beginning of one of the most remarkable
pontificates in the history of the Church a pontificate
remarkable not only for the great and stirring events
which were crowded into it, but also for its brevity,
lasting as it did but four years and nine months.

" He could not tell that within five short years he
would be called into the presence of the Master whom
* Tarleton, pp. 65, 66.

THE ENGLISH POPE 67

he had just been chosen to represent on earth ; but if
he had known this, and had determined to crowd into
that short time all the stirring events and great deeds
that he could look for, he could not have made it fuller
than it actually proved to be."*

From the moment of his election to that of his death
Pope Adrian was called upon to grapple with some of
the most difficult and momentous questions of both
home and foreign policy that have ever fallen to the lot
of a Pontiff to meet. No wonder that he afterwards said
to his friend John of Salisbury that " the tiara was
splendid because it burnt with fire."f

" At the moment Adrian IV. took his seat behind the
helm of Peter s bark the winds and waves raged furiously
against her, nor ceased to do so during the whole time
that he steered her course. That time, though short,
was yet long enough to prove him a skilful and fearless
pilot as much so as the very foremost of his prede
cessors or successors, who have acquired greater fame
than he, simply because a more protracted term of
office enabled them to carry out to completer results
than he could do designs in no wise loftier than Adrian s,
and, in so doing, to unveil before the world more fully
than was permitted to him characters not therefore
nobler or more richly endowed than his."J

The new Pope found his first troubles already awaiting
him in the city of which he was not only Bishop, but also
temporal Sovereign. These troubles, caused by the
agitation of the Republican party in Rome, headed by
the turbulent Arnaldo da Brescia, the disciple of Abelard,
had raged fiercely under the pontificate of Eugenius III.,
the pupil of St Bernard. Though somewhat lulled
during the brief and peaceful pontificate of Anastasius,
they broke out with fresh violence on the election of
Adrian. The Pope was met at his accession by a
peremptory demand of the Senate, prompted by

* Tarleton, p. 66. f " Polycraticus," viii. 23.

I Raby, p. 17.

52

68 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Arnaldo, to renounce once for all his rights of temporal
government, and to recognise the authority of the
Roman Republic. They had strangely miscalculated
the character and temper of the new ruler. The demand
was sternly rejected by the unflinching Pope. Arnaldo
himself hastened to Rome, and the mob broke out into
open disorder and violence, culminating in a murderous
attack on Cardinal Gerard in the Via Sacra. Adrian s
action at this critical moment was prompt and decisive.
From Anagni, to which he had retired, he issued a stern
decree, placing Rome under an interdict. Never before
in history had this most dreaded weapon of spiritual
chastisement been applied to the Eternal City. No
wonder it was received with consternation.

" No calamity which could befall a city in those times
and they were days when calamity had full meaning,
days of the storm and sack, of the plague and famine-
could be more dreaded than that of interdict."*

I need not here repeat the description of the effects
of an interdict. And if this dread censure produced such
an impression even in England in the days of King John,
what must have been its effects in the very centre of
Christendom itself ? To add to its horrors, the interdict
began on Palm Sunday, and lasted during Holy Week,
thus seriously affecting, not only the spiritual, but also the
temporal, interests of the Roman people, to whom Easter
has always been a season of great profits, owing to the
number of pilgrims flocking to their city. Adrian s
strong action was completely successful. After some
ineffectual parleying, he gained all that he demanded :
the abrogation of the Republic, the banishment of
Arnaldo, and the absolute submission of Senate and
citizens to their lawful Sovereign the Pope. Then, and
only then, did the latter return to his city, which, we are
told, he entered in triumph amid the joyful acclamations
of his people ; and in his cathedral of St. John Lateran
he celebrated his coronation with great pomp and jubilee.
* Tarleton, p. 98.

THE ENGLISH POPE 69

V. THE CHAMPION OF THE CHURCH.

At the very time that Adrian was engaged in this stern
contest with his disaffected subjects a still more serious
danger was hanging over Italy and the Papal See. This
was the impending invasion of Frederic Barbarossa,
" the mightiest monarch of Western Europe since Charles
the Great." The motives which led the young and
mighty Emperor to undertake this expedition were to
reassert the Imperial claims over Italy which he pro
fessed to have inherited from Charlemagne, and to con
firm them by his coronation in Rome ; and also, no
doubt, to check the growing spirit of freedom which was
already beginning to show itself, especially among the
Lombard cities of Northern Italy. To complicate the
situation, Arnaldo and the Roman Republic had already
sent a letter to Frederic, inviting him to come and receive
the Imperial crown from the Senate ; but, fortunately
for the Holy See, the invitation was worded in such
bombastic and insolent terms that the Emperor indig
nantly rejected it.

About the very time of Adrian s election Frederic,
with his large army, was crossing the Alps, and, being
encamped at Roncaglia, he held a great Diet to receive
the homage of his Italian feudatories. A very few days
after Adrian s coronation in the Lateran, Frederic
received the Iron Crown in the church of Pavia. All
Lombardy was now in his power, and the last city to
resist Tortona fell after a gallant struggle. The great
Emperor and his victorious array was already entering
the Campagna. It was a moment of painful doubt and
suspense. The new Pope might well have addressed the
stern monarch in the words of the King of Israel s
messenger to Jehu, as he approached at the head of his
troops : " Thus saith the King : Is there peace ?"
(4 Kings ix. 19).

It was fortunate for the Pope that Frederic had set his
heart on being crowned, like Charlemagne, by the hands

70 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

of the Pontiff himself. Herein the quick glance of the
diplomatic Adrian saw the advantage which he un
doubtedly held in treating with the irresistible Emperor
on something like equal terms.

At the same time that Frederic sent envoys to Rome
to ask for his solemn coronation in St. Peter s by the
Pope s hand, Adrian had despatched three Cardinals to
meet Ferderic in order to ascertain his intentions, and
also to induce him to aid in seizing Arnaldo of Brescia,
who was engaged in his old game of stirring up disaffec
tion against the Holy See in the Campagna. On the
arrival of the two Archbishops who were Frederic s
envoys, Adrian took the bold and firm stand of declining
to consider the Imperial proposals until he should have
received a reply to his own demands, and an assurance
that the Emperor was approaching with friendly inten
tions. This strong attitude met with success. The
Papal legates soon ascertained that the Emperor was
far from supporting Arnaldo and his followers against
the authority of the Holy See, and, indeed, was so much
incensed against the demagogue that he was quite
willing to procure his seizure, which was speedily
effected.

Before passing on, we must say a word about the well-
known fate of this unfortunate man. Arnaldo, on being
delivered up to the Papal authorities, was imprisoned in
the castle of St. Angelo, with the intention, it is said, of
being ultimately tried before Frederic himself, on the
latter s arrival in Rome. But the Prefect of Rome,
Peter, fearful of the great danger to which the presence
in a city seething with sedition of so formidable a prisoner
exposed the public peace, of his own authority, and in the
absence of both Pope and Emperor, caused the unhappy
man to be led out on the morning of June 18, 1155, and
executed by the cruel and barbarous death of burning at
the stake before the Porta del Popolo. Mr, Tarleton s
comment on this tragic end of the famous demagogue
seems to me just and equitable :

THE ENGLISH POPE 71

" In judging the act of execution, we must be careful
not to measure the sentiments of those days by the
moral standard of our own, and Arnold s death seems to
have been the only course left to those responsible to the
Pope for the order of the city. On the other hand, we
must apply some moral standard to acts like this, and
not allow the consideration of difference in custom and
thought to weigh against the sentiment of justice.
Rarely, if ever, in history is there an occasion when the
execution of a man without trial can be excused."*

Meanwhile Adrian still displayed great caution in his
preliminary negotiations with the Emperor. He sent
word to the latter at Sutri that before the favour asked
was granted, Frederic would have to take an oath on the
Gospels and on the Cross before the Papal envoys to
protect the Pope and Cardinals against aggression, to
uphold the Papal dignity, and not to usurp any of its
functions. In return, the Pope promised to go and meet
the Emperor, and escort him in state to Rome for his
coronation. The haughty Frederic complied, and took
the oath with great solemnity.

On the following day, June 9, 1155, took place the
historic scene in the camp at Sutri which I am about to
describe. Adrian IV., with all his retinue of Cardinals
and other attendants, advanced in state from his castle
at Nepi, where he had been waiting, the Pope riding,
according to custom, upon a white palfrey. A splendid
deputation of German Princes and Bishops received him,
and conducted him to the Imperial tent. The gigantic
Emperor advanced to welcome the Pontiff. And now
occurred that dramatic incident, so often described in
history, which to me has always appeared to be the
most thrilling episode in the career of the English Pope.
It was an old tradition, generally accepted hi those ages
of faith, that a King, meeting the Pontiff when mounted,
must not only assist him to dismount, but, as a sign of
supreme veneration, must hold his stirrup as he did so.
* Tarleton, pp. 106, 107.

72 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

This right of the Pope to homage was acknowledged by
the old German legislation, as expressly stated in the
two great codes of national law the Schwabenspiegel*
and the Sachsenspiegel-f and had been observed by
the Emperor Lothair towards Pope Innocent II. The
proud Hohenstauffen, however, was by no means in a
mood to submit to the humiliation which he felt to be
involved in performing the ceremony before all his barons
and troops, and, though he bowed low and offered to
assist the Pontiff to dismount, he abstained from
holding the stirrup. The situation had all at once become
acute : it was a moment of crisis the two strongest men
in Europe, the English Pope and the German Kaiser,
face to face, and a momentous question of privilege,
behind which great issues were at stake, to be settled
between them. Both potentates were unyielding.
Adrian, unflinching before the mighty warrior King,
calmly kept his seat, and refused to dismount until the
due act of homage had been rendered. Frederic was
angrily obdurate. Already the German soldiery were
beginning to murmur aloud, and we are told that the
Cardinals who formed the Papal suite were so terrified
at the ominous state of things that they promptly fled,
leaving the Pope alone to confront the storm. Yet
Adrian retained all his cool courage, and with great
dignity dismounted himself, and allowed the Emperor
to conduct him to the seat prepared for him. On this he
sat, and allowed Frederic to kneel and kiss his feet ; but
when the Emperor arose to receive in return the kiss of
peace, Adrian calmly but firmly declined to give it,
declaring that until the homage had been paid to him in

* " Der Papst erhalt die beiden Schwerter von Gott ; fiir sich
behalt er das geistliche Schwert, das weltliche Schwert iibergibt
er dem Kaiser, und wenn er se^nen weissen Zelter besteigt, muss
ihm der Kaiser den Ziigel halten " (Articles 9 and 10 of Preface).

j " Dem Papst ist auch gesetzt dass er zu gewisser Zeit auf
ienem weissen Pferde reiten mag, da ihm dann der Kaiser den
Steigbi igel halten soil, damit der Sattel sich nicht wende " (p. 17,
ed. Gartner, Leipzig, 1732).

THE ENGLISH POPE 73

full, he would withhold his blessing and decline to crown
the Emperor. In vain the latter argued the question
with great vehemence and every kind of argument.
Adrian, feeling that he stood forth as the champion of
the Holy See in a matter which, trivial as it may seem
to us now, yet was in those days but a symbol of great
and momentous principles of international law lying
behind, remained inflexible and fearless, and, finally
quitting the Imperial camp, returned unmolested to
Nepi. He had proved the stronger man of the two.

After his departure, Frederic, whose great ambition,
as we have seen, was to be crowned by the Pope in Rome,
suffered himself to be persuaded by his entourage to
yield to the Pontiff s demands. On June n he followed
the Pope to Nepi. Adrian rode forth once more to meet
him, and as he approached, the haughty Barbarossa,
advancing on foot, took hold of the Pope s stirrup,
and helped him to alight. The Pope then embraced
the Emperor, and gave him the kiss of peace, amidst
the plaudits of all the spectators. So had Adrian
conquered.

" In requiring Frederic Barbarossa to pay him the
typical homage of holding his stirrup, Adrian did plainly
nothing but what was entirely in accordance with the spirit
of the age, and, at the same time, with traditional usage
as then received by Christian Princes. But Frederic did
do what was contrary to both in his refusal, and that, too,
while professing to be imbued with the very faith out
of which the homage in question sprang. Thus, it is no
wonder that Adrian should view such an inconsistency
as most inauspicious for the liberties of the Church, with
which those of society were then so closely bound up,
and should therefore feel it imperative to pursue a line
of conduct which at first glance may appear so arrogantly
exacting, but which, found on closer examination to
have involved the assertion of the most sacred interests
against a man who was known to respect none in pro
motion of his ends, assumes a character calculated

74 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

rather to conciliate our approval than to confirm our
censure."*

The Emperor and the Pope, now reconciled, entered
Rome side by side in triumph, and on June 18 Frederic
was solemnly crowned in St. Peter s by Adrian, amidst
a scene of great splendour and rejoicing. But these
festivities were held in the midst of a city teeming with
disaffection, soon to break out into open violence.
Mutual exasperation existed between the Emperor and
the Senate. The insolent messages of the latter had been
rejected with scorn by Frederic, who had occupied the
Leonine city with his troops. Immediately after the
coronation a very serious riot broke out in the city, and
Frederic s troops, hard pressed, had to fight all day long
for their very lives. After a desperate battle, Frederic was
victorious, the Romans suffering severely in both killed
and prisoners, and, but for the intervention of the Pope,
summary vengeance would have been executed upon the
latter by the Imperial forces. But, in spite of his
triumph, Frederic felt himself in not a very secure posi
tion. Not merely the ill-restrained hostility of the
Roman citizens, but the difficulty of obtaining food for
his large army, owing to the animosity of the peasantry
and the oppressive heats of June, were sufficient reasons
to make him hasten his departure northwards. At
Tivoli Pope and Emperor separated with mutual expres
sions of goodwill, though the peace which had been made
between the two powers was of rather a hollow kind.
Frederic, forced by the circumstances of his position,
rapidly marched northward, " not so much gratified by
the acquisition of the Imperial crown as embittered by
what he had gone through in the pursuit of it, and
resolved not to delay longer than he could help a second
invasion of Italy, which should compensate the mishaps
and mortifications of the first, "f

So ended the first round in the mighty struggle between
Empire and Papacy the " Hundred Years War," as
* Raby, pp. 47, 48. f Ibid., p. 54.

THE ENGLISH POPE 75

Alzog styles it. And it must be admitted that, on the
whole, Adrian had had the best of the contest with the
first and greatest of the Hohenstauffens.

Frederic s departure left the much-tried Pontiff no
single moment of peace or rest. Already was he involved
in yet another difficult and dangerous contest with the
Norman King, William of Sicily. The feud between the
Norman conquerors of Sicily and the Holy See had been
of long standing, the Pontiffs claiming feudal overlord-
ship over all Southern Italy as inheritors of the rights of
the Western Empire, and this had led to frequent serious
wars in preceding pontificates. Just one year before
Adrian IV. was crowned Pope, William II. caused himself
to be crowned King of Sicily at Palermo without obtain
ing previously the Papal sanction (Easter Day, 1154).
On Adrian s succession, William sent him the customary
congratulations ; but Adrian was not the man to brook
any diminution of the traditional rights of the office
which he now held, and he promptly declined to recognise
William s kingly title. An invasion of Southern Italy
and devastation of parts of the Papal territories was
William s reply, at the very same time that Frederic
Barbarossa was advancing southward in his quest of the
Imperial crown. It would take too long to narrate the
long and varied fortunes of this contest between the Pope
and the Sicilian King, complicated as it was by the secret
plotting of the Greek Emperor, who sought to turn
matters to his own profit. Adrian took the strong step
of excommunicating William, and though the latter at
first paid little heed to the much-dreaded censure, yet
the offer of the Greek Emperor to form an alliance with
the Pope against him alarmed him so much that he
begged for release from the sentence, and offered to do
the required homage to the Pontiff for his kingdom of
Sicily.

Unfortunately, Adrian s perplexity was increased by a
difference among his own Cardinals, the German party
among them strongly opposing any compromise with the

76 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Sicilian monarch. They prevailed, and the war went on.
The tide of success turned strongly in William s favour,
whose successes at Brindisi and Bari were marked with
a ferocious cruelty that struck terror into his opponents.
By May, 1156, we find the Pope almost besieged in
Benevento, and cut off from Rome by the victorious and
ruthless Sicilian King. Adrian now negotiated once
more with equal skill and firmness, and the result was a
fairly satisfactory peace. The King, with great solem
nity, did homage and swore fealty to Adrian as his over
lord for Sicily and the various principalities in South
Italy, promising to defend him against his enemies, and
to pay a yearly tribute for three of the duchies. In turn,
the Pope relieved William of the excommunication, and
confirmed him in the feoff of his kingdom, but also con
ceded to him very large rights of ecclesiastical patronage
and other extraordinary regal privileges with regard to
the Church in Sicily, which we may be sure nothing but
the stern pressure of circumstances could have induced
so good a Churchman as Adrian to yield to the secular
power.

So ended the long and dangerous feud with the Sicilian
King. The following winter, 1156-1157, Adrian spent
quietly in Viterbo, the first and last period of calm peace
during his stormy pontificate. But for the troubles of
the two following years there is every reason to believe
that the great Pontiff would have taken in hand a work
which was, after so many centuries, one of the favourite
preoccupations of Leo XIII. the reunion of the Western
and the Eastern Churches. He corresponded with the
Patriarch of Constantinople, the Byzantine Emperor,
and Bishop Basil of Thessalonica, on the subject, and also
received a deputation of several Greek Bishops to solicit
his protection against certain encroachments of the
Knights Hospitallers. Unfortunately, the troubles of
the last years of his reign put an end to any hopes of
furthering the work he had so much at heart.

THE ENGLISH POPE 77

VI. THE LORD OF THE ISLES.

We must here say something about Pope Adrian s
relations as Pontiff with his own native country.

Immediately on Adrian s election, King Henry II. of
England, who had acceded to the throne almost at the
same time,* sent a deputation, consisting of the Abbot of
St. Albans and three Norman Bishops, to offer his con
gratulations to the English Pontiff. They carried many
rich gifts, including three mitres and some beautiful
sandals " worked by Christina, Prioress of Markgate."
The old chroniclerf tells us that Adrian refused all the
presents except the mitres and sandals, good-humouredly
remarking that he must refuse the Abbot s gifts because
the monks of St. Albans had refused to accept him when
as a boy he had offered himself at their gates. The witty
Abbot readily replied that the rejection must have been
God s will, as He had destined the postulant for a far
more exalted station. That Adrian really preserved no
resentment is shown by his reply to the Abbot, bidding
him ask for what favour he wanted, and adding : " You
know that the Bishop of Albano could never refuse any
thing to St. Albans."

The envoys also presented to Adrian a letter from
Henry II. It is difficult to read this rather preposterous
document (preserved by Peter of Blois) without a smile.
The Plantagenet King, after warm congratulations and
expressions of joy upon Adrian s elevation, proceeds to
lecture the Pope in somewhat paternal fashion as to his
future government of the Church, and to offer him advice
as to his choice of Cardinals and holders of ecclesiastical
benefices. The advice given is doubtless excellent,
but it reads rather oddly from one who was soon to
become the persecutor of the Church in his own

* October 25, 1154; Adrian s election, December 3 of same
year.

f " Chronicon Monast. S. Albani."

78 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

kingdom, and to cause the martyrdom of St. Thomas
of Canterbury.

In his first creation of Cardinals, which occurred the
following year (December, 1155), Adrian raised to the
dignity of Cardinal-Deacon his nephew and secretary,
Boso Breakspeare,* formerly a Benedictine monk of
St. Albans. One of the three medieval lives of the
Pope, published by Muratori, is held by Watterich
and others to be from Boso s pen. This is, however,
doubtful.f

But the Englishman who has left us most information
about Pope Adrian was his intimate and familiar friend
John of Salisbury. This celebrated English Churchman,
once a pupil of Abelard, and in later life Bishop of
Chartres, spent a good deal of time with Pope Adrian
during the latter s brief pontificate. He has left us,
in both his " Poly era ticus " and his " Metalogicus,"
abundant and most interesting materials concerning the
English Pope, which not only contain valuable informa
tion, but give us a thorough insight into his frank and
straightforward character, his common-sense, and his
real humility amid all the splendours of his exalted office.
In the long and confidential conversations which John
reports, the latter ecclesiastic spoke to the Pope with a
freedom and openness in the way of frank criticism that
are rather astonishing. But this criticism, and even
blame, the Pontiff seems not only to have taken with
humility, but even to have invited. Again, he spoke
frequently in a truly touching manner of the troubles
and burdens of his high office :

" The office of Pope, he assured me, was a thorny
one, and beset on all sides by sharp pricks. Indeed,
the burden of it would weigh down the strongest man
and grind him to the earth, ... He wished that he

* Boso was promoted cardinal-priest under the next Pope,
Alexander III. He played a part of some prominence in Rome,
and died about 1181.

f It is generally held to be by Cardinal Nicholas of Aragon
(c. 1350). The life by Boso is probably lost.

THE ENGLISH POPE 79

had never left his native land of England, or at least had
lived his life quietly in the cloister of St. Rufus, rather
than have entered on such a narrow path ; but he dared
not refuse, since it was the Lord s bidding. ... It
seemed once, he said, as if God was constantly beating
me and stretching me out as with a hammer on an anvil.
Now I pray Him to aid me with this burden which He
has placed on my shoulders, for I find it unbear
able. "*

After what we have heard of the troubles and worries
of his stormy pontificate, we should not be surprised at
this lament of Pope Adrian.

But the most famous affair in which the English
Pope and the English King were brought into relation
was that of the so-called Bull Laudabiliter, with reference
to the lordship of Ireland. It would be quite impossible
for me to treat at length this cause celebre. I should
require to write an entire article in order to treat it
at all satisfactorily. Volumes have been written upon
it, and even angry controversy has raged around it.
Every point connected with it has been hotly denied
and as hotly defended. Let me very briefly indicate
merely the state of the controversy. And first of all I
must dispel a very popular delusion on the subject.
It is commonly enough supposed that Adrian issued a
Bull giving Ireland to Henry II., and that on the
strength of this document Henry straightway invaded
and conquered the sister island. This is quite an
incorrect statement. What history does record is as
follows :

John of Salisbury writes, in the concluding chapter
of his " Metalogicus " :

" At my request (Adrian) granted to the illustrious
King of the English Ireland, to be held by hereditary
right, as his letter testifies to this day. For all the
islands by ancient right are said to belong to the Roman

* " Polycraticus," Iviii., c. 23 (translated by Tarleton, pp. 151,
152).

So SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Church by virtue of the donation of Constantine, who
founded and endowed it. He also sent by me a gold
ring adorned with a splendid emerald, whereby an
investure should be made of the right to govern Ireland,
and the said ring was ordered to be kept in the public
archives of the Court."

The actual text of the letter herein referred to is
professed to be given by Giraldus Cambrensis in three
different works of his (" Expugnata Hibernia," ii. 5 ;
" De Rebus a se Gestis," 10 ; and " De Instructione Prin-
cipis "), also in several English chroniclers (Ralph de
Dice to, Roger Wendover, Matthew Paris), from which
sources it has been taken over into both the Annals of
Baronius and the Roman " Bullarium," It seems to
have been accepted unhesitatingly as genuine in Ireland
and England, as elsewhere. But in course of time the
controversy has arisen as to whether the supposed Bull
is not, after all, a forgery, and even the very categorical
statement of John of Salisbury a forged addition to his
real work.

There is evidence to show that, although in 1315 the
Princes and people of Ireland, in a remonstrance to
Pope John XXII., mention the fact of Adrian s granting
the lordship of Ireland to Henry II. (dominium contulit),
yet so early as 1325 doubts really existed in Ireland
upon the subject, as shown in a letter by the Lord
Justiciary and Royal Council of Ireland to the Pope.
But with that exception no trace of doubt or denial
is found until the year 1615, when Father White, S.J.,
in his " Apologia pro Hibernia," and the learned Arch
deacon Lynch in his " Cambrensis Eversus," both
attacking the veracity of Gerald the Welshman, main
tained the new theory of the forgery of Adrian s letter,
Since then the controversy has continued. Eminent
names can be cited on both sides. To be brief, it must
suffice to give the following table of the chief subsequent
writers for and against the authority of the Bull at
home and abroad on either side of the controversy :

THE ENGLISH POPE

Si

FOR THE AUTHENTICITY.

Lingard (" History of

England ").

Lanigan (" Ecclesiasti
cal History of Ire
land ").

1849. Kelly (editor of " White
and Lynch ").

1884 and 1899. Rev - Sylvester
Malone (in Dublin
Review, and " Pope
Adrian IV. and Ire
land ").

Pfulf, S. J. (in " Stim-
men aus Maria
Laach," xxxvii.).

1893. Miss Kate Norgate (in
English Historical Re
view, vol. viii.).
Bishop M. Creighton (in
" Dictionary of Na
tional Biography").

1896. Tarleton ("Nicholas
Breakspear)."

AGAINST THE AUTHENTICITY.
1750. MacGeoghegan (Paris).

1864. Damberger (in Der

Katholik}.
1872. Cardinal Moran (in Irish

Ecclesiastical Record).

1882. " Analecta Juris Ponti-

ficii."

1883. Abbot Gasquet, O.S.B.

(Dublin Review, July
and October).

1 88$. Jungmann (" Disserta-
tionesSelectae," torn,
v.).

1890. Bellexsheim ("Geschichte

der Kirche Irlands ").

1891. Fr. Morris, of the Ora

tory (" Ireland and
St. Patrick ").

1892. Von Pflugck-Harttung

(in Zettschrift fur

Kirchengeschichte).
1898. L. Ginnell (in New Ire
land Review ; also

" Doubtful Grant of

Ireland ").
1903. O. J. Thatcher (" Studies

concerning Adrian

IV.," Chicago).

In face of such a divergence of eminent names, it may
seem rash indeed in an amateur to pronounce an opinion
either way. I can only say that, having very carefully
read all I could procure on both sides, I have become
convinced that the most satisfactory conclusions have
been reached by three of the writers just named viz.,
Miss Norgate, Mr. Tarleton, and Father Malone. The
extremely judicial summary of the controversy by the
first-named writer in the pages of the English His
torical Review has specially impressed me. To my
mind these writers have succeeded in establishing satis
factorily : (i) the authenticity of the concluding passage
of the " Metalogicus " of John of Salisbury ; (2) the
genuineness of the letter Laudabiliter as given by Gerald

6

82 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

and others. I admit that some difficulties still remain,
such as certain differences in several texts of the Bull,
and the somewhat mysterious neglect of Henry to use
it when obtained ; but in spite of such obscurities, I am
disposed to decide in favour of the traditional story.*

According to this, then, Henry II. applied to Adrian
by means of John of Salisbury to obtain Papal approval
for an expedition into Ireland in order to put an end
to prevalent lawlessness in Church and State " to root
out crime and wickedness, to defend and preserve the
rights of the Church, "f with an undertaking also to
establish an annual tribute of Peter s Pence. It is
clear that Henry must have impressed the Pope with a
shocking idea of the state of things in Ireland to draw
from him the approval of his projected expedition
and a command to the people of Ireland to receive and
obey him as their liege-lord. It is further to be noted
that in granting this approval Adrian expressly bases
his right so to do upon the overlordship of all Christian
islands appertaining to the Holy See in virtue of the
supposed " donation of Constantine,"J a right generally
acknowledged and widely acted upon in those days.

Now, it is to be observed that this privilege of
Adrian IV. was never put into use by Henry II. It
appears to have been laid aside in the archives of

* The latest writer, Professor Thatcher, has rather novel views.
He believes, indeed, that Adrian actually did make an offer to
Henry of Ireland as a fief to be held from the Church, but that
Henry " endeavoured to secure Papal recognition of his absolute

Possession of it, while the Popes regarded it as the property of
t. Peter." On the other hand, he considers both the letters of
Henry II. and the Laudabilitev as we now have them to be quite
worthless and forgeries "mere medieval students exercises."
Professor Thatcher s monograph seems the most thorough and
critical study of the sources that has yet appeared.

f " Ad subdendum ilium populum legibus et vitiorum plan-
taria inde extirpanda. . . . Pro dilatandis Ecclesiae terminis,
pro vitiorum restringendo decursu, pro corrigendis moribus et
virtutibus inserendis, pro Christianae religionis augmento."

J " Hiberniam et omnes insulas quibus Sol justitise Christus
illuxit ... ad jus b. Petri et Sacrosanctae Romanae Ecclesiae
non est dubium pertinere."

THE ENGLISH POPE 83

Winchester, together with the emerald ring sent by Adrian,
just as his predecessor, Alexander II., had sent a " ring
of great price " to William of Normandy when blessing
his expedition into England in 1066. It was not until
1171, twelve years after Adrian s death, that Henry II.
invaded Ireland, and even then with no reference to
that Pope s letter, but in consequence of a series of events
which began with the outrage inflicted upon O Rourke,
King of Breiffny, by MacMurrough, King of Leinster,
and the subsequent interference of Robert Strongbow,
Earl of Striguil. And, in order to obtain sanction for
his proceedings in Ireland, Henry applied for and ob
tained other letters from Pope Alexander III., couched
in pretty much the same strain, though without reference
to that of Adrian, which became literally a dead letter.*
It is evident that the question of the authenticity
or otherwise of Adrian s letter is quite distinct from
that of the approval or disapproval of his action. I
shall not enter into a discussion of that much-debated
point. It is, however, but fair to make the following
observations :

(1) With reference to the motives which led Adrian
to sanction Henry s project, Miss Norgate truly observes
that " our inquiry has nothing to do with the real
condition of Ireland in the time of Adrian : all that it
has to do with is Adrian s idea of that condition. "f We
cannot doubt that the idea was largely, if not exclusively,
based upon the accounts transmitted to him by the
English King.

(2) As to the actual state of Ireland at the time,
however greatly Henry s agent may have exaggerated
the reports about it to the Pope, the Rev. Sylvester
Malone quotes evidence^ from the native Irish annals
exclusively, for the fifty years before Adrian s privilege,
which give a sad picture of the state of society and

* Miss Norgate truly points out that the Lauddbiliter is in no
sense a Bull ; it is a commendatory letter.

t Op. cti., p. 36. { Op. cit., pp. 8-1 1.

6 2

84 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

public morality, which the " Annals of the Four
Masters " concisely sum up in the statement that " all
Ireland was a trembling sod."

(3) Whatever view we may take nowadays of Adrian s
right to interfere in the case, it is but just to place our
selves as far as we can in the position of a Catholic of
those days. To such a one the Papal action in this and
other similar cases appeared not only natural but quite
consonant with the public international law which
prevailed. And although we now know that the so-
called " donation of Cons tan tine," upon which the
Papal overlordship of all islands was based, is apocryphal,
still it must be remembered that in those days it was
universally accepted and acted upon with the general
consent of the Christian nations.

These considerations may perhaps somewhat atten
uate the censures even of those who most severely
condemn the Papal action.

VII. THE LAST ACT.

We must now hurry to a close. The concluding years
of Adrian IV. s life were darkened by a fresh and more
serious contest with the haughty German Emperor.
Various causes led to this fresh struggle. Frederic had
departed in anything but a satisfied state of mind to
Germany, and the news of the peace concluded between
the Pope and the King of Sicily greatly annoyed him,
for he himself claimed as Emperor feudal rights over that
kingdom, as over all Italy. On the other hand, the
Holy See had serious reasons to be aggrieved at the
conduct of Frederic. One reason was the outrageous
attack and imprisonment inflicted upon Adrian s old
friend of Scandinavian days, Archbishop Eskil of Lund,
by some of the Emperor s unruly knights, for which
deed the Pope justly felt bound to claim satisfaction.
Another was a cause which has repeatedly drawn the
Holy See into conflict with Kings and Princes the

THE ENGLISH POPE 85

defence of the sacredness of the marriage tie, for Frederic
(as, centuries after, Napoleon) had divorced his childless
wife Adelaide, and taken as a fresh wife Beatrice,
heiress of Burgundy. In the Diet held at Besanon in
1157 two Cardinal-Legates (one of whom, the dauntless
Roland, was destined to be the next Pope) appeared
from Adrian with a strong letter of complaint about
the affair of Eskil. A somewhat imprudent style of
address adopted by Cardinal Roland at the beginning
of the interview evoked a first outbreak of wrath on
the part of the Emperor and his nobles, but a single
word in the Pope s letter, misunderstood or misinter
preted, fanned the flames into a serious conflagration.
Adrian in this letter made use of the word beneficium
in speaking of the favour he had granted to Frederic
two years before in crowning him in Rome. It is clear
that the word was used in its natural and obvious sense
of a " benefit " or " favour " ; but Frederic s evil
genius, the Chancellor Reinhold von Tassel (whose ideal
seems to have been the creation of a national German
State Church, with a German Pope*), translated the word
into German as if used in its technical and legal sense
of a " fief." This would seem to imply that the
Emperor was but the feudal vassal of the Pope. A
terrible tumult was the result. The Legates narrowly
escaped being cut down by the enraged Princes, and,
though saved by the Emperor s personal intervention,
were driven ignominiously out of the country. Adrian s
subsequent negotiations were conducted with prudence
and skill, and in a second legation, in 1158, he was able
to explain to the Emperor the misinterpretation that
had been placed upon his words, and, Frederic pro
fessing himself to be satisfied, a reconciliation was once
more, though only temporarily, effected between the
two Powers.

* Hefele, " Conciliengeschichte," v., p. 478. It was this
Reinhold who carried away the bodies oi the three Magi from
Milan to Cologne, where they still repose in the Dom.

86 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Notwithstanding this, however, in the November of
the same year (1158) Frederic undertook his second
invasion of Italy. The object of this expedition was to
crush once for all the nascent spirit of Italian independ
ence, and to establish the absolute and despotic supre
macy of the Emperor over the whole of Italy. What
this meant will be gathered from the doings of the
Diet held on the plain of Roncaglia, near Piacenza
(November 23), to promulgate a new code of Imperial
law. At this Diet the lawyers of Bologna were induced to
declare " imperatorem esse Urbis dominum." The jurist
Luca di Penna is said to have affirmed, " The Emperor
is on earth what God is in heaven " ; and the servile
Archbishop of Milan, Uberto, almost blasphemously
exclaimed : " Tua Voluntas jus est /" No wonder that
such an assembly, in which, to their shame be it said,
fourteen Italian States took part, passed decrees
forfeiting to the Emperor all the royalties, dues, and
other customs, and exacting homage from all Bishops
and nobles. Milan, the city which stood out in the
cause of liberty, had been besieged, taken, and
humiliated. Other cities suffered similar fates.

The year 1159 was a terrible one for Italy. " Never,
perhaps, had Lombardy been so miserable as it was
in the early months of 1159." It was at this juncture
that Pope Adrian stepped forth as the champion of
Italian liberty. In his letters he severely blamed the
weakness of the Lombards, encouraged the Milanese,
fearlessly bearded the ruthless tyrant, withstood him in
the affair of the Archbishopric of Ravenna, and daunt-
lessly upheld the rights of the Church and the Holy See.
He made a powerful appeal to the three Archbishop-
Electors of Germany, and at the Diet of Bologna, in the
Easter of 1159, practically offered to the all-powerful
Emperor by his legates an ultimatum, behind which
was the dread threat of deprivation of the Imperial
crown and excommunication. This sturdy bearding
of the lion in his den has won the just admiration of

THE ENGLISH POPE 87

historians. There can be no doubt that to the unflinch
ing courage and splendid example of the English Pope
the Italian States owed much of that spirit of resolute
independence which, years after Adrian s death, was to
bear splendid fruit in the victory of Legnano.

War now seemed inevitable. The Emperor was
advancing Romewards ; Adrian was fortifying his
fortresses. The insolence of Frederic s letters proved
that all reconciliation was impossible, and Adrian was
preparing to issue the dreaded Bull of excommunication
against the Emperor, both for his public misdeeds and
for putting away his lawful wife and taking to himself
another. At this critical moment God suddenly called
him by an attack of quinsy, which ended fatally on
September i, 1159. His enemies of the Imperial party
spread the absurd report that he had been choked by a
fly, and this ridiculous story has come down with so
many other " lies of history." His body was carried to
Rome, and buried in a red marble sarcophagus, next
to that of Eugenius III., in old St. Peter s. In 1607
it was removed to the new basilica, where it may still
be seen in the crypt, with the simple inscription,
" Hadrianus Papa 1 1 II." On the occasion of the trans
lation the body was exhumed, and is said, together with
the pontificals in which it was arrayed, to have been
found entire.

So ended the remarkable career of the first and last
Englishman who ever attained to the Papal throne, and
one of the greatest and ablest of all the successors of
St. Peter. I have endeavoured, not without difficulty,
to compress within a moderate space but a jejune
summary of the stirring events of his extraordinary
pontificate, and even so have had to omit even reference
to several other great questions in which he was involved,
such as the organization of the Spanish Church, the
projected expedition of Louis VII. of France into Spain,
and the bringing about of good relations between France
and England. It must be remembered that all the really

88 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

great and important events of European history were
crowded into a brief pontificate of less than five years,
and we shall then have some idea of the energy, the
strength of will, the statesmanship, and the political
genius of this truly great man.

As regards his personal character, history records of
him that he was eminent for great learning, for eloquence
as a preacher, for his splendid voice, his beauty and
dignity of person, and passing sweetness and kindness
of disposition. Of other traits of character we have
already spoken in preceding pages.

He is mentioned as having written several works, all
unfortunately lost to us. One of these, it is interesting
to note, was upon the Immaculate Conception of the
Blessed Virgin.*

In estimating his political actions as Pope we must
be careful to judge according to the notions and principles
of his own times. To modern readers much of it may
appear overbearing or arbitrary ; but let us not forget
that, as a man of the highest integrity and courage, he
felt himself bound before God and man to maintain and
transmit that great heritage of power and authority
which he had received from his predecessors. Not only
that, but in stepping forward to uphold the cause of
the Church and Italy against the greatest and most
formidable of all the German Kaisers, he became the
saviour of Europe and of Christendom.

" His object " (writes Bishop Creighton) " was to
maintain the claims of the Roman Church as they had
been defined by Gregory VII. In this he showed skill,
resoluteness, and decision ; but he had for his antagonist
the mightiest of the Emperors. He bequeathed to his
successor a hazardous conflict, in which the Papacy
succeeded in holding its own."t

* Translations into English of the Apostles Creed and the
Lord s Prayer (the latter metrical), attributed to Adrian, are
still preserved (see Tarleton, p. 254).

j- " Dictionary of National Biography," vol. i., p. 145.

THE ENGLISH POPE 89

Had Providence not raised up this great Englishman
at the time, what would have been the result to Italy
and to the Church of the West ? The glorious history
of the struggle for freedom of the Italian Republics
would never have been written, and the Church of
Europe, absorbed in a new and irresistible Csesarism,
would have been brought to the condition of the
Orthodox Russian Church under the Tsars, or of Islam
under the Sultans of Turkey.

It has been not unjustly pointed out that German
nationality and unity, too, are indebted to the stand
made by Adrian and his successors against Barbarossa s
plans. For had his scheme been carried out, and had
the Emperor really become " Urbis Dominus," the seat
of empire would in all probability have been transferred
to Rome ; Italy would have become the centre of
gravity of Europe, and Germany would have remained
a half -civilized and outlying province of the Empire.

BOOKS TO BE CONSULTED.

ALFRED H. TARLETON. "Nicholas Breakspear (Adrian IV.):

Englishman and Pope." London: Arthur L. Humphreys,

1896.
RICHARD RABY. " Pope Adrian IV. : An Historical Sketch."

London : Richardson and Son, 1849.
Very Rev. SYLVESTER MALONE, M.R.I. A., F.R.S.A.I. "Adrian IV.

and Ireland." Dublin: Gill and Son, 1899.
OLIVER JOSEPH THATCHER. " Studies concerning Adrian IV."

Chicago : The University of Chicago Press, 1903.

IV

THE CHURCH AND THE PRINTING-PRESS*

PRINTING A CATHOLIC ART.

THERE are many people who are either not aware or
will not admit that the connection between Catholic
truth and the printing-press is one of ancient date and
closest intimacy. It has become part and parcel of
what may be styled the " Reformation myth " and the
" Protestant legend " that, somehow or another, the
printing-press was intimately connected with the so-
called Reformation, and an English historian is sup
posed to have neatly summed up this view by styling
the printing-press " the great hammer of the Reformers,
by which they broke to pieces the power of the Papacy."
The legend goes further still. According to what I will
style the Luther myth based, indeed, as will be seen
later, on words of Luther himself, and still piously
believed in by many an earnest Protestant and repeated
in books of history the beginning of Martin Luther s
spiritual awakening was the fact that in 1505, Luther s
twenty-second year, " one day he accidentally took from
the shelves of the library [of the University of Erfurt,
where he had studied for four years, and just taken his
doctor s degree] a book he had not seen before an old
Latin Bible. Delighted with this treasure, only scraps

* Chief authorities : Janssen, " Geschichte des deutschen
Volkes," Bd. I., pp. 9-20, 50-54 ; Von der Linde, and Falk,
several articles in the Dictsche Wara-nde (in Dutch), tt. I. and
III.

90

THE CHURCH AND THE PRINTING-PRESS 91

of which he had as yet heard of, he read it read it again
and again, and committed large portions to memory."
This anecdote (which I quote from Dr. Bullock s well-
known manual of the modern history of Europe, in
use in English schools) I beg the reader to bear in mind,
as it will receive much interesting elucidation from the
historical facts I am about to present to his notice.

In order to understand what follows, it will be neces
sary to refer briefly to what is known of the origin and
the early history of the art of printing.

We may begin by asserting unhesitatingly that, what
ever be the subsequent history and character of the art
of printing, in its origin and early history it was an
essentially Catholic art Catholic in invention, Catholic
in its use, and, above all, for long exclusively consecrated
to the propagation of Catholic truth. The invention of
the art of printing with movable types dates from the
year 1441, or forty- two years before the birth of Martin
Luther. Its inventor was almost certainly John
Guttenberg of Mainz.

It will be interesting to know with what sentiments
the new invention was received by the Church and her
ministers at the time. The Carthusian monk Werner
Rolewinck greets it in these terms in 1474 : " The art
of printing, invented at Mainz, is the art of arts, the
science of sciences, through whose rapid spread the world
has been enriched and enlightened by a splendid treasure,
hitherto hidden, of knowledge and wisdom. An endless
number of books which hitherto were known to only a
few students in Athens or Paris, or other Universities, are
now disseminated by this art through all races, peoples
and nations, and in every language." The Benedictine
historian of Westphalia, Bernhard Witte, monk of Lies-
born, speaks of the art of printing as one " than which
there hath never been in the world any art more worthy,
more laudable, more useful, more holy or divine."
Another contemporary, Jacob Wimpheling, wrote : " We
Germans can pride ourselves on no other discovery or

92 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

intellectual production so much as upon that of printing,
which has raised us up to be new intellectual carriers of
the teaching of Christianity, of all Divine and mundane
knowledge, and so to be benefactors of all mankind."
The old chronicle of Koelhoff contains the following
expressions : " How many prayers and numberless
inward aspirations are drawn from printed books ! What
great profit and happiness are derived by those who
make or help to prepare printed books !"

The new art was disseminated throughout Europe
with astonishing rapidity and inexpressible religious
enthusiasm not, be it observed, as a commercial specu
lation or for the sake of material advantages, as the
telephone or the typewriter in our own days, but rather
as a religious work and a means of propagating Catholic
truth. From 1462 to 1500 the names of one thousand
printers, mostly of German origin, have been preserved.
In Mainz itself, during the very infancy of the art, five
printing-presses were established, in Ulm six, in Basel
sixteen, in Augsburg twenty, in Cologne twenty-one ; in
Nuremberg, up to 1500, five-and-twenty printers had
been admitted to the rights of citizenship. Before the
end of the fifteenth century over one hundred German
printing-presses had been established in Italy.* By the
same date Spain reckoned thirty printers, whom the
Spanish poet Lope de Vega elegantly entitled " the
armourers of civilization." The art reached Buda-Pesth
in 1473, London in 1477, Oxford in 1478, Denmark in
1482, Stockholm in 1483 (the year of Luther s birth),
Constantinople in 1490.

Those early printers who went forth from the birth
place of the new art to propagate it in various lands
were looked upon by their contemporaries almost with
veneration, as new missionaries and apostles of the truth.
" As formerly the missionaries of Christianity," writes
the before-quoted Wimpheling, " so now the disciples

* Where Dante s " Divina Commedia " was first printed as early
as 1472.

THE CHURCH AND THE PRINTING-PRESS 93

of the holy art go forth from Germany into all lands,
and these printed books become, as it were, heralds of
the Gospel, preachers of the truth and of knowledge."
" How much all classes of human society," wrote, in
1487, Adolf Occo, physician to the Bishop of Augsburg,
" nowadays owe to the art of printing, which, through
the mercy of Almighty God, has been made known in
our time, any sensible man can easily judge for himself.
But whilst all are under obligations to it, it is in an
especial degree the bride of Christ, the Catholic Church,
who hath been newly glorified by means of this art, and
who now, more richly adorned, goeth forth to meet her
Bridegroom, for He hath endowed her to overflowing
with books of heavenly wisdom."

THE VIEW OF THE CHURCH.

What, it may be asked, was the view of the Church
herself, and what part did she practically take in the
art of printing ? The materials for an answer to this
question are abundant indeed. Bish6ps, like Rudolf of
Scherenberg and Lorenz of Wiirzburg, granted indul
gences for the sale and dissemination of printed books.
Berthold, Archbishop of Mainz, speaks of the " Divine
art of printing." The following letter from Andrea de
Bossi, Bishop of Aiaria, in Corsica, was written in 1468,
to Pope Paul II. :

" In your time, by the grace of God, has this gift been
bestowed upon the Christian world, that even the poorest,
for a few coins, can obtain for themselves a number of
books. Is it not a great glory for your Holiness that
volumes which formerly could scarcely be bought for a
hundred ducats at present may be had for twenty gold
pieces, or less, and are no longer full of errors, as they
used to be ? and that books which the reader formerly
bought with difficulty for twenty ducats can now be got
for four, and less ? And again, whilst all the most
eminent minds of antiquity, on account of the wearisome

94 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

labours required, and the too great cost of hand copying,
were formerly almost buried under dust and moths, they
have now again, under your rule, begun to reappear,
and, like a broad stream, are poured forth all over the
earth. For so masterly is the art of our printers and
type-engravers, that not only among human inventions
of modern times, but also among those of antiquity, it
would be difficult to find anything more excellent. . . .
This is the reason why the laudable and pious wish of
Nicholas Cusanus, Cardinal of St. Peter s ad Vincula,
always was that this holy art, which then first saw the
light in Germany, should be introduced into Rome.
Already have the wishes of this man, whom you, Holy
Father, loved as the apple of your eye, honoured and
admired, been fulfilled in your own time, as I believe,
through his intercession at the throne of our Lord Jesus
Christ."

The introduction into Italy of the art of printing, here
referred to by Bossi, was the work of the two German
printers Konrad Sweynheym and Arnald Pannartz, who,
be it noted, set up their first printing-press in the great
Benedictine abbey of Subiaco, whence, later on, they
proceeded to Rome, under the special patronage of the
Holy See. Von der Linde, the historian of printing, has
recorded that from 1466 to 1472 they published twenty-
eight works, in forty-seven different editions, so that he
calculates that this one press, during a space of seven
years, must have issued more than 124 millions of
printed pages, and truly remarks, " How many scribes
would have been necessary to write out in MS. all these
pages !"

" In taking a general survey of the books issued by
the English presses upon the introduction of the art
of printing," writes Abbot Gasquet, "the inquirer
can hardly fail to be struck with the number of
religious, or quasi-religious, works which formed the
bulk of the early printed books. This fact alone is
sufficient evidence that the invention which at this

THE CHURCH AND THE PRINTING-PRESS 95

period worked a veritable revolution in the intellectual
life of the world was welcomed by the ecclesiastical
authorities as a valuable auxiliary in the work of
instruction. In England the first presses were set up
under the patronage of Churchmen, and a very large
proportion of the early books were actually works of
instruction or volumes furnishing material to the
clergy."*

THE RELIGIOUS ORDERS AS PRINTERS.

It was not only, however, by their praise and their
blessing that the clergy encouraged the art of printing ;
they themselves, and especially the religious Orders,
took an active part in the work of the printing-press.
The Brothers of the Common Life, well known as the
congregation to which Thomas a Kempis belonged, set
up a printing-press in their house at Rostock, and issued
their first printed book as early as 1476, in which they
speak of the art of printing as " the mistress of all arts
for the benefit of the Church," and style themselves,
" preachers, not by word, but by writing." One is
reminded irresistibly by these words of the maxim of
the late Cardinal Vaughan, " This is the age of the
apostolate of the press ;" and of the saying attributed,
I think, to an American ecclesiastic that, if St. Paul
were living now, he would be, not a preacher, but the
editor of a great newspaper.

But to return : It was not only in Rostock that the
Brothers of the Common Life practised the art of
printing in their convents. Very early on they set up
a well-appointed printing-press in their convent of
Nazareth at Brussels, where we find them busily at
work between 1476 and 1484. Seventeen works pub
lished at their press are known. Several of these bear
the imprint " in famosa civitate Bruxellensi per fratres
com. vitse in Nazareth." The " Groto solitos sive

* " The Eve of the Reformation," pp. 315, 316.

96 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Speculum Conscientiae " of Arnold of Gheilhoven was
the first book printed in Brussels. In their convent at
Hem, near Schoonhoven, they announce in 1495 that
they print books in both Latin and German.*

MONASTERY PRESSES.

The following are some more examples of these
monastery printing-presses :

At Augsburg, in the Benedictine abbey of Saints
Ulric and Afra, Abbot Melchior set up a printing-press
(1472), in order to supply his monks with constant work
in printing, correcting, binding, and publishing books.
In the monastery of St. Peter at Erfurt, Abbot Gunther,
with the approval and support of many other monas
teries, established a press in 1479, the first work issued
being a " Lectionarium," or Book of Epistles and
Gospels.

The Benedictine abbey of Ottobeuren possessed an
unusually extensive press, concerning which Maurus
Feyerabend says in his chronicles : " At this time the
immortal Abbot Leonhard, assisted by the learned
Ellenbog, who was already at that time Prior of the
community, set up a printing-press in his monastery,
wherein, with the exception of Marc Elend, a monk from
Fiissen, who cleaned the formes, only monks of the
monastery itself were employed."

The Cluniac monks of St. Albans in England had a
press, wherein, between 1480 and 1486, eight works were
printed by the unknown master called the " School
master." One of these books was the celebrated
" Bokys of Hawking and Hunting " of Dame Juliana
Berners, Prioress of the neighbouring convent of Sope-
well, 1485.

* The same brothers set the example of printing in the Rhine-
land, where they opened the first of all monastery presses at
Marienthal as early as 1468.

THE CHURCH AND THE PRINTING-PRESS 97

The Carthusians of Cologne printed a considerable
number of books from 1490 onwards. The same Order
had also a press at Strasburg.

In Italy we find a press in the Minorite monastery at
Venice in 1477, and in the same year the Carthusians
are printing at Parma. About the same time at
Savona, near Milan, in the Augustinian convent, we
find one of the brothers, known as " Bonus Joannes,"
engaged in printing the " Consolations " of Boethius,
whilst the Prior Venturinus corrects the proofs. Still
more remarkable is the activity of the Italian Dominicans
in this direction. Between 1476 and 1483, in the
Dominican convent of Florence, two brothers of the
Order, Domenico da Pistoja and Pietro da Pisa, as they
themselves tell us, are busy producing printed books in
great quantity, in so much that by the year of Luther s
birth this monastery press had issued no less than
seventy or eighty printed works, the highest record
attained by any of these monastic printers.

In the far east of Europe the work of these convent
presses was still more important. Duke George of
Montenegro, whose father had founded the monastery
of Cettinje in 1485, set up therein, at his own cost, in
1494-1495, a press, where the monk Macarius printed
with finely-cut Venetian letters. Duke Bozidar of Servia
between 1519 and 1528 had liturgical works printed at
Venice, being aided in his undertaking by the monk
Pacomius from Montenegro, two other monks, and a
priest. Indeed, according to Schafarik, all the old Slav
printed books, especially those in the Cyrillic character,
were produced by the monks.

In addition to the monasteries where the monks
themselves worked at the press, quite a long list could
be given of other convents, both of men and women,
wherein printing-presses were set up and worked by
professional printers some, masters of their art, whose
names are still famous, others itinerant printers, who
went about from town to town to earn their bread.

98 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Following Falk, I will mention the following religious
houses which had presses of this kind :

The great abbey of Cluny, about 1493 ; St. Michael s
Abbey at Bamberg ; the Cucufatis Monastery, Barce
lona, about 1489 ; the convent of the discalced Fran
ciscans at Sontheim, near Frankfort, 1511-1512 ; the
great Carthusian monastery at Lyons, 1517 ; the
Premonstratensian convent of Our Blessed Lady at
Magdeburg, about 1504 ; that of the Holy Trinity
at Miramar in Majorca, 1495 ; that of Sant Eusebio
in Rome, 1470 ; the Benedictine monastery of Saint
Yrier de la Perche, near Limoges, and also that of
Zinna, or Cenna, 1492 ; the Benedictine abbey of
Lantenai in Brittany, in 1480 ; the Camaldulensian
monastery at Fonte Buono in Lombardy, 1520 ; the
monastery of Santa Maria della Grazia in Milan, 1499 ;
and that of St. Ambrogio in the same city, 1486 ; at the
Carthusian monastery of Namur, 1485 ; the Premonstra
tensian monastery at Schussenried in Swabia, 1478 ;
the Hieronymites in Valladolid, and also at Montserrat ;
the Carthusian monastery of St. Andreas in littore in
Venice, 1508 ; also the convent of the Sisters of Penance
at the same place ; and, finally, the celebrated Swedish
convent of St. Bridget in Wadstena, about 1491.

SECULAR " PRIEST-PRINTERS."

So far we have spoken only of the regular clergy as
taking an active part in the work of printing ; what is
perhaps more remarkable is the large share taken in this
practical cultivation of the art of printing by the secular
clergy. Falk has compiled a list of priests, in different
parts of Europe, who occupied themselves in the manage
ment of printing-presses. From this it appears that
the names of thirty-one priest-printers in twenty-seven
different towns have been preserved. The first of all
printers in Venice according to some, the first in all
Italy was the priest Clement of Padua, 1471, and he

THE CHURCH AND THE PRINTING-PRESS 99

was a self-taught adept of the art. The names of three
other priests, out of the two hundred printers who were
at work in Venice before 1500, have been preserved ;
they are Lorenzo de Aquila, Boneto Locatello, a priest
of Bergamo, and Francesco da Lucca, priest and cantor
at the church of San Marco. At Milan a number of
ecclesiastics encouraged, at their own expense, the in
troduction of printing, and one of them at least, Giam-
pietro Casaroto, was himself a printer in 1498. In
Florence three priests Lorenzo de Morgianis, Francesco
de Bonaccursi and one Bartolomeo printed several
books between 1492 and 1500, whilst the Provost of
the Duomo, Vespucci, corrected the proofs. It was a
German priest from Strasburg, Sixtus Kissinger by name,
who first introduced printing into Naples, and who
refused many honours, including a bishopric, in favour
of his art. He, and also another German priest, Schenk-
becker, afterwards a Canon of the Chapter of St. Thomas,
both practised the art later on in Rome. At Vicenza
and at Trent we find parish priests printing books.
Other priest-printers are enumerated at Barcelona,
Basel, Breslau, Brixen, Briin, Copenhagen, Leipsic,
Lerida, in Catalonia, Metz, Mainz, Liibeck, and even in
Iceland, where the first press was erected before 1534
by Bishop John Areson.

I must not weary my readers with extending this
long enumeration. Enough has surely been said to
show with what enthusiasm the clergy of the Catholic
Church both welcomed and practically helped in the
work of the printing-press in the earliest days of its
infancy. The same lesson is taught by the munificent
patronage extended by the clergy to printers and their
productions. Cardinal Turrecremata in 1466 and Car
dinal Caraffa in 1469 invited distinguished German
printers to Rome, and by 1475 the Eternal City already
possessed twenty printing-presses, and by the close of
the century 925 printed works had been issued from
these presses. It was the clergy also who were the

72

ioo SKETCHES IN HISTORY

chief purchasers of printed books, and to their
generous support the success of the art must be largely
attributed.

I think I have now said enough to enable us to judge
of the correctness of the statement which represents the
printing-press as the " hammer for the destruction of
Papacy." It would be no exaggeration to say that for
full fifty years before the date of Luther s famous visit
to Rome the art of printing was the favourite and most
powerful sword in the hands of the Papacy, and that
we may not unjustly attribute to the efficacy of this
" divine art," as it was called by monks and bishops
of the time, the protection of a large part of Catholic
Europe from the effects of the so-called Reformation.

THE LUTHER LEGEND.

Let me now remind the reader of the famous anecdote
of Luther s " discovery" of a Latin Bible in the library
of the Erfurt University, that familiar commonplace of
the Protestant Reformation myth to which I have
referred at the beginning of this address. In order to
appreciate aright the worth of this story, a few more
historical data must be given, not forgetting that the
famous scene is placed in the year 1505. Now, the facts
are these. Of all the works printed by the one thousand
printers whose names are still preserved before the year
1500, no book was so often printed, especially in
Germany, as the Bible. By the year 1500 no less
than one hundred editions of the Vulgate, or Latin
Bible, had appeared, and Janssen has shown that at
this time the ordinary number of copies per edition
of a printed book was about one thousand. More than
this, in 1483 the year of Luther s birth the first
edition of the Bible in the German language appeared
in Koburger s press, and was illustrated with one
hundred wood engravings of Wolgemuth, and between
that date and the outbreak of the great religious schism

THE CHURCH AND THE PRINTING-PRESS 101

no less than fourteen different editions of the entire
Bible in High German, and five in Low German, had
already been published, to say nothing of numerous
editions of separate parts of Holy Scripture, such as the
Psalms or the Gospels.

How warmly the people of Germany were urged
to read these editions in the vernacular may be seen
from some of the quaint passages from contemporary
Catholic writers quoted by Janssen. " All that Holy
Church teaches," says a writer in 1513, " all that thou
hearest in sermons and other instructions, what thou
readest written in spiritual books, what thou singest to
God s honour and glory, what thou prayest for thy soul s
welfare, and what thou sufferest in trial and trouble,
should encourage thee to read with piety and humility
in the Holy Scriptures and Bibles, as they are nowadays
set forth in the German tongue, and scattered far and
wide in great numbers, wholly or in part, and as thou
mayest now purchase them for but little money." The
editors of the Cologne Bible of 1470-1480 declare that
they have illustrated their edition with woodcuts in
order to attract readers the more to the diligent use
of Holy Scripture. Everything shows that the wide
diffusion of the Holy Bible, in both Latin and German,
at the close of the fifteenth century had given quite a
remarkable impetus to the study of Holy Scripture.
Adam Potken, a priest of Xanten, had, as a boy, between
1470-1480, to learn by heart the four Gospels, and later
on used to read daily, with his scholars of eleven or
twelve years of age, portions both of the Old and the
New Testament. In 1480 a Canon of Cassel founded
at Erfurt University a scholarship in favour of a student
of his village, for an eight years course of the study of
Holy Scripture.

I think my readers will now have sufficient material to
judge for themselves of the inherent probability of the
Luther legend. By the year 1500, five years before the
Erfurt episode is alleged to have taken place, the

102 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

printing-presses of Europe (all Catholic, be it noted,
and many of them monastic) had issued one hundred
different editions of the Vulgate or Latin Bible, equiva
lent to at least one hundred thousand copies. In ad
dition to this, at least five or six translations of the
complete Bible into German had also been printed, and
theT.reading and study of Holy Scripture was widely
diffused and warmly encouraged throughout Germany.
At such a time and in such surroundings Martin Luther,
a talented student of the University of Erfurt, having
already taken his bachelor s and doctor s degree, and
being in his twenty-second year, is supposed to make
an accidental discovery of a Latin Bible in the University
library, a book he had never seen before, and the un
expected discovery and reading of which, we are asked
to believe, effects a crisis in his intellectual and spiritual
life!

The extraordinary thing is, that this incredible tale is
directly based on Luther s own words, who says :
When I was twenty years old I had never seen a Bible ;
I thought there were no other Gospels or Epistles except
those in the Postillse " (i.e., ll Commentaries " ; see his
collected works, edited by Plochmann and Irischer,
Erlangen, 1826-1868, vol. lx., p. 255). What are we to
think of the veracity of this statement ? The judgment
of Janssen seems but mildly expressed when he intro
duces the quotation with the phrase if one may believe
his words," and adds : " These words are all the more
wonderful, as, when he was twenty years old, he had
already been two years at Erfurt University, and
cannot have failed to have many opportunities to get
to know the Bible. For at Erfurt Biblical studies had
flourished since the middle of the fifteenth century ;
among the MS. theological works existing in one of
the town libraries about one-half consist of exegetical
works."

I would venture to submit that the only charitable
explanation for so fantastic a tale would be to imagine

THE CHURCH AND THE PRINTING-PRESS 103

the young doctor of Erfurt as a kind of intellectual Rip
Van Winkle, who had been sound asleep all those years
of his student life, whilst the noise of over a thousand
printing-presses in monastery, cathedral, and printing
works was filling the intellectual atmosphere of Germany,
and stirring up a new and warmer intellectual life
throughout the ranks of clergy and laity alike, and most
of all by the diffusion and diligent study of the Holy
Scriptures.

Subsequent abuses of the printing-press, and evils
which it may afterwards have given rise to, whether
in the intellectual or moral order and no one can shut
his eyes to the serious extent of such evils can therefore
never deprive the art of printing of the title it inherited
at its birth of a truly Catholic art, and of one of the
noblest instruments of the Catholic Church. The ex
istence of the Catholic Truth Society in our midst is a
living proof that the printing-press has not yet lost, and
never will lose, its efficacy for doing good by the spread
of Catholic truth.

V

THE DUTCH POPE

I. THE SCHOLAR AND PROFESSOR.

ONE dark winter s evening, somewhere about the year
1480 so runs the charming legend* the Princess
Margaret of York, sister of Edward IV. of England, and
widow of the ill-fated Charles the Bold, Duke of
Burgundy, f at that time residing at the Flemish
University town of Lou vain, was returning to her
residence in the ancient castle on Mont-Cesar { (where
nowadays rises the new Benedictine abbey of Regina
Cceli) when she called into one of the town churches
to offer a prayer.

" There was no light,

Save where the lamps that glittered, few and faint,
Lighted a little space before some saint."

She was struck by the sight of a young and impecunious
scholar poring over his books by the aid of one of those
lamps, too industrious to waste the precious hours

* The story is not found in either Moringus, Adrian s first
biographer, Valerius Andreas, Vernulaeus, or Molanus.

f See genealogical table, p. 115.

J There is, of course, no foundation for the popular legend that
the original structure was one of Caesar s camps. It had, how
ever, a very interesting history as the feudal castle of the Counts
and Dukes of Brabant. In 1338, Edward III. of England and
his queen wintered here on their way back from Germany.

104

THE DUTCH POPE 105

which might still be devoted to study, too poor to
" waste the midnight oil " in his own humble lodgings.
Touched by the youth s zeal and poverty, the widowed
English Princess continues the story immediately
took upon herself the care of his future, and provided
him with the means to pursue his further studies at the
University founded some half -century before by John
the Good, Duke of Brabant.

The pretty story in this form unfortunately seems not
to bear the test of historical accuracy ; nevertheless,
there is this much of truth underlying it, that Margaret
of York actually did afford substantial support and
patronage, though in somewhat different form and at
a later date, to this modest scholar, who was one Adrian
of Utrecht, a young Dutchman, whose name is one of the
brightest ornaments of the Flemish University.

Adrian was born in Utrecht in 1459. His father was
one Florent, or Florensz,* whence he came to be styled
in after-life Master Adrian Florisze, though this latter
name was no surname, but simply meant " son of
Florent," exactly as the latter is sometimes styled
" Florent Boeijens," or " Bouwens " i.e., son of
Baldwin ; for at this time the common people of the
Netherlands had no family surnames, a distinction
reserved to the nobility. This fact is of interest, for
it indicates that Adrian was of humble plebeian origin,
just like the English Nicholas Breakspeare, who eventu
ally became Pope Adrian IV. It does not, however,
seem correct to say that he was actually very poor, like
the English lad of Langley, for in the register of Louvain
University still preserved the epithet " pauper,"
which it was at the time customary to place beside the
names of indigent scholars when matriculated, does not
appear, and in 1469 and 1474 we find his widowed
mother, Gertrude, selling two,,houses, which indicates

* And not Floris, as Creighton writes it (" History of the
Papacy," vi., p. 222). Floris is the genitive form of Florent, and
used as a patronymic, as explained in the text.

io6 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

the possession of some property on her part. However,
it is certain that Adrian s parents were not much
blessed with the goods of this world. The father, who
seems to have been a small artisan, probably a weaver
of tapestry or of silk,* died by the time the boy was
ten, and once more, like Nicholas Breakspeare, the lad
owed his early training in both letters and piety to an
excellent mother. Gertrude, we are told, taught him
to love visiting the churches, to serve Mass, and to
listen attentively to the sermons, which she made him
repeat to her on his return home. As he had manifested
from his tenderest years unusual aptitude for learning,
she did all she possibly could to encourage and develop
his talents, and sent him to school to learn the trivium,
as it was then called, comprising probably Latin, with
arithmetic and logic. He learnt his first elements of
Latin at Delft, in the school of the Brothers of the
Common Life, a fact of considerable importance for his
future development. These Brothers of the Common
Life, whose name will ever be held in blessing for having
given to the world Thomas a Kempis, had been founded
in 1396 by Gerard Groote as a reaction against the
excesses into which scholasticism had fallen. " Let
the foundation of thy studies," said the pious founder,
" and the mirror of thy life be first of all the Gospels,
for they contain the life of Christ, then the lives of the
Saints and the sentences of the Fathers, the Epistles
of St. Paul and the Acts of the Apostles. . . . Lose not
thy time in geometry, rhetoric, dialectic, grammar,
poetry, and astrology. All that doth not render us
better or turn us away from evil is harmful."

Like most reactions, Gerard s teachings went to
extremes, and after his death his Order considerably
modified them, and cultivated science and literature
with success. But it inherited his practical tendencies

* Lord Bacon makes him a brewer (" Historia Henrici VII.,"
p. 1037). I do not know where Creighton (op. cit., p. 222) got
the idea that he was a " ship s carpenter."

THE DUTCH POPE 107

in education, and his aversion to the exaggerated
subtleties of the later scholasticism. In such a school
as that of Delft we see the source of that love of Scripture
and the Fathers, that good common -sense in philosophy,
and that dislike of pedantry which distinguished Adrian
through all his life. After the school of Delft, Adrian
completed his preliminary studies either at Zwolle,
where Thomas a Kempis had lived his religious life of
seventy-one years, or, according to others, at Deventer.
Everywhere distinguished by his brilliant successes,
which placed him far ahead of all his competitors, he
was ready at the age of seventeen to enter the nourishing
University of Louvain, just fifty years founded, and at
the time one of the most celebrated in Europe. Adrian
was enrolled on June I, 1476.

The Flemish University had lately received large
additions to its ranks in the numerous students who
had fled from the University of Prague, which had been
destroyed in the Hussite wars, and in the four hundred
Burgundian subjects expelled from that of Paris by
Louis XI. Erasmus, who a few years later was Adrian s
own pupil at the University, declares that it was the
most numerously frequented of all except Paris, the
students surpassing three thousand in number, and
increasing day by day. " The climate," he boasts, " is
preferable to that of Italy, being not only delightful but
also healthy. Nowhere," he continues, " are studies
pursued with more success and quietude, nowhere is
the intellectual output more abundant, nowhere a larger
or better equipped staff of professors." The discipline,
if we may believe the descriptions of the time, was not
only severe but very well observed. After curfew the
students were forbidden to go out in public places
without carrying a lantern at the level of their face, and,
as at the Oxford and Cambridge of to-day, both masters
and students had to wear their gowns whether at church
or at lectures. Extravagant and worldly costumes
were forbidden, and when the students saw any of

io8 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

their number contravening this rule they ran after them,
hooting and crying, " Barbara ! Barbara !"

The University comprised five faculties Theology,
Canon Law, Civil Law, Medicine, and Arts, the latter
being a preparation for the other faculties. The wave
of the Classical Renascence had not yet made itself felt
in Louvain, and the study of philosophy was the chief
occupation of the faculty of Arts, the Humanities being
but little esteemed. Neither the rhetoric which was
taught at this time, nor the Latin which was in use,
seems to have been of a very high order, though things
were very soon after destined to be much changed for
the better. Four colleges or hostels, abundantly en
dowed with charitable foundations for poorer pupils,
were attached to the faculty of Arts, and bore the curious
names of the Pig, the Castle, the Falcon, and the Lily.
Life in these colleges was sufficiently strenuous and
severe. The students rose before daybreak, assembled
in the great hall for prayers, then attended a lecture,
after which, at six o clock, they heard Mass. The rest
of the day was passed in lectures, repetitions, and public
or private disputations. The course lasted two years,
apparently without any vacation. Notes were not taken,
and the whole work appears to have been a gigantic
effort of memory.

It was into the first-named of the four hostels (the
Pig College) that young Adrian made his entrance.
His exceptional gifts of intellect, his unusually powerful
memory, and his extraordinary zeal for study, soon
rendered him master of all that the faculty of Arts
could teach him at the time philosophy, physics,
rhetoric. His Latin style, though not adorned with the
graces which characterize the authors of the Renascence,
was sufficiently elegant to escape the biting criticisms
of Erasmus. For mathematics he showed a special
aptitude, and soon was called upon to teach them. No
wonder his fame rapidly spread in the University.
When the Venetian Ambassador, Hermolaus Barbarus

THE DUTCH POPE 109

accounted one of the leading Italian humanists of the
day* visited Louvain, and asked to be introduced to
an eminent member of the faculty of Arts, in order
to discuss philosophy with him, Adrian was at once
chosen, and we are told that the Venetian scholar was
charmed with the penetrating intelligence and varied
erudition of the young Dutch student.

One of the greatest events in the old University of
Louvain was the annual competitions at the close of
the Arts course for the much-coveted title of Primus,
or first in the faculty of Arts, a distinction which was
apparently as highly valued as the Senior Wranglership
in modern Cambridge, and celebrated by festivities,
both at the University and in the native place of the
successful candidate, in a style of which we have little
notion at the present day. We are not surprised to learn
that the Primus in 1478 was Adrian, then nineteen years
of age, on which occasion he made a public triumphal
entry into his native town of Utrecht. Immediately
after he passed the solemn act entitled inceptio, and
thereby became a fully-fledged Master of Arts.

His liberal education now completed, Adrian at once
began his course of Theology, which in those days lasted
no less than ten years. For this purpose he entered
the College du Saint-Esprit, founded in 1442 by Louise
de Rycke for theological students, and which, then as
now, was a hostel, giving board and lodging, though
not teaching. Of Adrian s long course of studies in
this faculty we have not many details. We know, how
ever, that he threw himself with all the ardour of his
nature and the keenness of his intellect into the study
of the Fathers and theologians, and also of Holy Scrip
ture ; and, not content with the varied studies of his
own faculty, he applied himself to those of both Civil
and Canon Law. No wonder that his biographer,
Moringus, expresses his astonishment that Adrian was
able to pursue with such success so many different

* See Abbot Gasquet, " The Eve of the Reformation," p. 29.

no SKETCHES IN HISTORY

branches of study at the same time, The explanation,
he tells us, is to be found in his methodical use of time :
every hour was employed by rule, and every occupation
had its fixed time. No wonder that he soon became
known as the most brilliant ornament of the University,
and eventually one of the greatest Catholic theologians
of the Reformation epoch. " Magnus sine controversia
theologus," writes Erasmus, his pupil.

At the end of ten years of this strenuous student s
life (in 1488) Adrian was appointed to teach philosophy
in his old college, the Pig, and also elected a member of
the General Council of the University ; and two years
later (1490) he was promoted to a professorship of
Theology, carrying with it a prebend and a stall as
Canon of St. Pierre. This promotion is the more re
markable as he had not yet obtained his degree as
Licentiate in Theology, owing probably to his want of
means to meet the expenses of the examination. Patron
age, however, now began to flow in upon him in a steady
stream. In the same year (1490) he received the ap
pointment of Cure of the Beguinage,* and his resources
now permitted him to proceed to the Licentiate s degree
in 1491, on which occasion, we are told, the magistracy
of Louvain offered him two measures of Rhine wine as
a mark of their esteem.

On June 21, 1491, Adrian at last crowned his career
by obtaining the coveted degree of D.D. The public
examinations, or " defensions," as they are styled, for
the obtension of this crowning academic honour, and
the elaborate function of its actual conferment, are
sufficiently imposing in the actual University in our
own times, lasting as they do three full days, and

* The Cure of the Beguinage in which Adrian dwelt No. 153,
Rue des Moutons is now the residence of my venerated master,
Mgr. T. J. Lamy, Emeritus Professor of Holy Scripture and
Semitic Languages, and well known by his numerous writings.
The house itself has been rebuilt since Adrian s time, but the
cellars and the garden are much the same as when he dwelt
there.

THE DUTCH POPE in

involving public celebrations in the town, as well as in
the academical premises. But in the early University
of the fifteenth century they were far more elaborate,
lasting no less than five days, and terminating with a
banquet given by the new doctors. The expenses,
therefore, were very considerable, and beyond the
reach of many a poor scholar. Here it is that we
come into actual historical contact with the English
Princess, Margaret Plantagenet, concerning whom we
related a pretty, though probably apocryphal, anecdote
at the beginning. What is certain is that, whether she
knew Adrian and had benefited him before or not, she
now stepped forward and generously defrayed all the
expenses of his doctorate. On this occasion also the
Louvain magistracy, according to a custom frequently
honoured at the time, contributed no less than forty-
eight measures of Rhine wine, costing thirteen gold
florins, in honour of the new doctor.

More substantial favours rapidly followed. Margaret
of York conferred upon Adrian the benefice of Goerzee,
in the island of Zealand, which he was allowed to retain
in absentia, whilst administering it by means of a pious
and capable curate whom he suitably maintained.
Several times a year Adrian visited his distant parish
to preach and shrive his people and reform abuses.
Other preferments quickly followed. It must be re
membered that those were the days of pluralities, before
the reform of the Council of Trent. We need not, there
fore, be surprised to learn that Adrian had conferred
upon him successively the benefices of Canon of St.
Peter at Anderlecht (Brussels), of Provost of St. Quentin
(Maubeuge), of Dean of Notre-Dame at Antwerp, and
of Canon and Treasurer of St. Mary s in his native town
of Utrecht. No doubt such cumulations of ecclesiastical
benefices in absentia were essentially an abuse, though
quite in the ordinary course of events. But in Adrian s
case the abuse was greatly diminished by the personal
sanctity of his life and the scrupulous justice of his

H2 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

administration. His own household was as simple,
his table as frugal, as ever. The large revenues of his
various benefices were spent, not on himself, but on
the poor of his flock, or on indigent students, and in
munificent foundations. Moreover, his intellectual
gifts, his theological and canonical abilities were placed
unstintedly at the disposal of all. People flocked to
consult him from all parts from Holland and Flanders,
from Hainault and from Zealand.

In the University he was now by far the man of
greatest mark. For full twenty years, from 1492 to
1512, he held the post of ordinary Professor of the
Theological Faculty. His lectures became renowned
for the solidity of their matter, and the clearness of
their style. His elocutionary gifts were remarkable.
He did not, indeed, publish much, though he wrote a
great deal. His principal theological work, entitled
" Qusestiones in Quartum Sententiarum Librum,"*
which was the resume of his lectures up to 1509, was
first published surreptitiously, and without the author s
knowledge, at Paris in 1516 by Godocus Badius, under
the editorship of a professor of the Sorbonne, Jacques
d Assoneville. The following year it was republished at
Louvain itself by Martin Dorpius, a pupil of Adrian,
and the work soon became popular, for other editions
followed at Paris, Louvain, Venice, Rome, and Lyons
all without any participation on Adrian s part. Its
merits were its simplicity and clearness, a return to the
method of St. Thomas Aquinas from the exaggerated
subtleties and quibblings of the later decadent scholastics.
Not less was the success of another work, " Qusestiones
Quodlibeticae," which ran through several editions in
Louvain, Venice, Lyons, and Paris.

The theological teachings of Adrian, collected from all
available sources, were skilfully edited and arranged
by my old master, Professor E. H. J. Reusens of Louvain,

* In spite of its name, not " a commentary on Peter Lombard,"
as Creighton calls it (op. cit., p. 222) ; see Lepitre, p. 29.

THE DUTCH POPE 113

lately deceased,* in his doctoral dissertation published
in 1862, f a mine of curious and useful information.

The highest University honours naturally fell to the
now famous theologian. In 1497 he was elected Dean
of the Chapter of St. Peter s, which carried with it the
functions of Chancellor of the University. On two
different occasions, in 1493 and in 1500, he was chosen
for the highest academic post, that of Rector Magnificus
of the University, which office in those days was tenable
for only six months at a time, but which carried with it
exceptional privileges and jurisdiction, both civil and
ecclesiastical.

Before quitting this first chapter of Adrian s life it
will be of interest to quote the descriptions which his
admiring contemporaries have left us of his personal
appearance and character.

He was tall, we are told, and well proportioned, his
eyes full of fire and intelligence, his eyebrows bushy,
his countenance ruddy and full of grace, the forehead
somewhat sloping, the nose aquiline. His manner was
dignified, grave, and modest, his lips ever graced with
a smile, his gestures calm, his eyes ordinarily cast down.
His eloquence was extraordinary, without either hesita
tion or precipitancy, his diction slow and majestic, his
voice both soft and penetrating.

To such a gracious exterior corresponded still more
precious gifts of soul and mind. His life was exemplary,
his fare frugal, though his table was always hospitable,
without luxury or excess. He abhorred the long
drinking bouts so dear to German students then as
nowadays. His meals were brief. He rose at midnight
to recite his breviary, and then returned for a brief
repose. By daybreak he said his daily Mass with the

* Died December 24, 1903. For biographical notice, see
"Revue d Histoire Ecclesiastique," vol. i., pp. 150-152
(Louvain, January, 1904).

f " Syntagma Doctrinae Tlieologicae Adrian! VI." (Lovanii
1862).

8

ii4 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

deepest piety. He was affable and kind to all who came
to seek his advice or aid. By practising strict economy
in his household, he was able to dispose of considerable
means, especially in favour of poor students, whose
needs he knew by personal experience. He bought them
books, paid for their board, encouraged their industry
not only by words, but by substantial rewards.

But Adrian s most munificent benefaction to his Alma
Mater was the erection of the splendid college which still
bears his name.* His own resources and the help of his
friends were severely taxed to erect such fine buildings,
which called forth the surprise of his contemporaries.
In one way this generous creation had an influence on
his future career. The celebrated Bernardino Carvajal,
generally known as the Cardinal di Santa Croce (from
his titular Church), sent by Pope Julius II. as his legate
to Germany, visited Louvain, and inspected the newly-
finished college. He expressed great surprise that a
simple Dean should have succeeded in erecting so
splendid an edifice. On his return to Rome, the
Cardinal spoke to Pope Julius in such high terms of the
Louvain professor that the Pontiff endeavoured, though
without success, to draw him to his Court. Adrian
steadfastly declined, but events of a different kind were
rapidly approaching to put an end for good and all to
his academic career, and to draw him into the vortex of
public life, and eventually to the highest attainable
careers in both State and Church.

We have already seen Adrian s indebtedness to one
royal Margaret, the widow of Charles the Bold and sister
of Edward IV., our English King. We are now to see a
still more important act of patronage on the part of
another royal Margaret.

Margaret of York, the early patroness of Adrian, was
godmother to the young Prince Charles, her step-great-

* College du Pape Adrien VI., in the Place de 1 Universite.
Restored in 1775. It was originally built for theologians ; it is
now appropriated to Arts and Law students.

THE DUTCH POPE 115

grandson, now, owing to the death of his father Ferdi
nand, heir to his grandfather, the Emperor Maximilian.*
Up to her death, the royal lady had charge of the infant
Prince, and afterwards he was in the care of a succession
of tutors, none of whom was very satisfactory or success
ful. For the wilful young Prince destined one day to
be the famous Emperor Charles V. had little or no
aptitude for learning. He hated Latin, never learnt to
speak German, and had but a poor knowledge of Spanish
and Italian-! He had equal difficulties with mathe
matics, in which science he was many years later
" coached " by his favourite companion, the Marquis of
Lombay, afterwards glorious in the annals of the Church
as St Francis Borgia. On the other hand, Charles
excelled in all military and physical exercises. In the
year 1512 his aunt, Margaret of Austria, daughter of
Maximilian (and therefore step-granddaughter of Mar
garet of York) who in her second widowhood presided
over a little Court at Mechlin, rendered brilliant by the
scholars and artists who frequented it selected the
famous Louvain professor Adrian to undertake the
weighty task of educating and training the young Prince,

* The following table will serve to render somewhat more
intelligible the rather complex genealogies mentioned in this
article :

SPAIN. GERMANY.

Frederick III.
(Emp.).

Ferdinand=plsabella. Maximilian =p
(Emp.). |

BURGUNDY. ENGLAND.
Philip the Good. Richard, Duke of
| York.

Charles the Bold = Margaret Edward IV
of York
(and wife).
Mary (by ist
wife).

Juana =F Philip (Spam)
("Jeanne la ("LeBeau").
Folle").

Margaret of Austria, mar. :
(i) Juan, son of Ferdinand
and Isabella of Spain).
(2) Philibert, Duke of Savoy.

Charles V. Ferdinand
(Emp.). (Emp.).

f It may have been a realization of his own defects that caused
him to utter in after-life the oft-quoted dictum : " Plus de-
langues qu un nomine S9ait parler, plus de fois est-il homme."

82

n6 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

then in his twelfth year, as well as his sisters, the
Infantas Leonora, Maria, and Isabela. This new and
honourable charge was the turning-point in Adrian s
career. He had now to quit for ever his Alma Mater,
where he had resided for no less than thirty-six years,
and lay aside his beloved studies, to take up his residence
at Mechlin.* Whatever regrets he may have felt at this
sudden break in his career at the age of fifty- three, he
threw himself whole-heartedly into his great task. For
a great task it was. In the youthful Charles he was to
train him who was destined one day to unite the triple
sovereignties of Germany, Spain, and the Low Countries,
and to become the mightiest monarch in Christendom.
If Adrian did not have much success in the intellectual
training of his somewhat refractory pupil, at least he
seems to have produced a profound impression upon his
mind. Austere and severe in himself, with the highest
ideals of duty and responsibility, he strove to form the
young Prince s heart upon the noblest maxims of
Christianity. He found his pupil, says Vicenzo Quirino,
hot and impetuous in character, like his celebrated
ancestor, Charles the Bold. Adrian did not natter his
faults. He impressed upon him the emptiness of riches,
honours, and success ;f he warned him against the
tongues of flatterers ; taught him that God had chosen
him solely for the welfare of his people, and would one
day demand of him a rigorous account of his stewardship.
It is true that there was much in the subsequent career
of Charles that belied these noble maxims, as we shall

* This would seem at first to dispel the popular Louvain tradi
tion that Adrian and his royal pupil lived during this time in the
Castle of Mont-Cesar alluded to above. Yet, according to
Reusen s account (p. xiv), Adrian had already been teaching
Charles, as a little boy from his seventh to his twelfth year, during
the greater part of the year which the young Prince was wont to
spend in the castle of Mont-Cesar, whilst Adrian was still Pro
fessor of Theology. In 1512 he removed altogether to Court.

| Did Charles s mind recur to these teachings of his old master
when, at the close of his reign, he resigned his crown and passed
his last years in religious retirement ?

THE DUTCH POPE 117

see in the course of this recital ; but he frequently
referred with gratitude to the teachings of " Master
Adrian," to whom he declared he was indebted " for
what little of letters and good morals God had given
him." He showed his gratitude, indeed, very soon ;
for, on attaining his legal majority, his fifteenth year,
in January, 1515, he at once nominated Adrian to a seat
in his Council as Sovereign of the Low Countries. One
of his fellow-councillors, William of Croy, Marquis of
Chievres, seems to have resented this nomination,
perhaps because of Adrian s plebeian origin, perhaps
fearing his influence over the mind of his pupil. He
sought and found opportunities of removing the favoured
tutor from the Court on various honourable missions,
twice to Holland, and a third time, in the September of
the year, on a highly weighty embassy to Ferdinand the
Catholic, King of Spain, Charles s maternal grandfather.
In thus, through motives of jealousy, sending Adrian far
away from the petty Court of the Low Countries, the
ambitious courtier all unconsciously provided a stepping-
stone to the most exalted dignity which the Dutch tutor
was destined, in the brief space of seven years, to attain.
Adrian, little dreaming that he would never again see his
native land, far less of the high destiny that Providence
had in store for him, quitted Flanders, and, passing
through France, visited the famous Sorbonne of Paris,
where his fame as a theologian had long preceded him,
and even engaged in a public philosophical discussion in
that ancient University.

II. THE AMBASSADOR AND STATESMAN.

The object of Adrian s embassy to Spain was kept a
secret ; it was announced that he was going " par devers
le roy d Arragon, pour aucuns grans affaires secretz dont
n est besoin icy faire declaration." In reality, he was
to treat of the highest matters of State, which were to
effect the whole future of European politics. Adrian s

n8 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

task was no other than that of winning over the old
Spanish King to consent to his grandson Charles suc
ceeding to the Spanish Crown, instead of his younger
brother Ferdinand, whom the King, irritated by the
action of his son-in-law, would have preferred as his
successor. It would be too long to narrate the difficult
negotiations which Adrian had to conduct with the aged
and infirm King, whose last days were rapidly ap
proaching. His difficulties were the greater in that he
had first to gain the support of his all-powerful Minister,
one of the greatest politicians of his day, and the greatest
Minister that Spain has ever seen, the famous Franciscan
Cardinal Ximenes. It speaks volumes for Adrian s tact
and prudence, as well as for the high reputation for
sanctity and learning which had preceded him, that he
won over both the great Cardinal and the aged and sus
picious King, who was delighted with the Ambassador s
prudence and virtue, mingled with firmness. He suc
ceeded in negotiating a treaty, by means of certain
prudent concessions, and before the King died had
secured for his pupil and Sovereign the succession so
much desired. The death of the King rendered Adrian s
position still more delicate. Ximenes was appointed by
Ferdinand s will as Regent of Castile, for which post
Charles now designated Adrian himself. Nevertheless,
by a friendly agreement, Ximenes and Adrian undertook
the government jointly, though Adrian was not to bear
the title of Regent, but only of Charles s Ambassador.
It cannot be denied that Adrian s position at this time
was one of great difficulty. Whatever his talents, there
is no doubt that as a politician and statesman the ex-
professor of Louvain could not in any way compete,
either in political genius or experience of affairs, with the
great Cardinal. Add to this that the latter was a native
Spaniard of whom his countrymen were justly proud,
whilst Adrian was a foreigner, only just arrived in the
country from the " barbarous North," and the haughty
Castilian nobles were little likely to brook the inter-

THE DUTCH POPE 119

ference in their affairs of an obscure and humbly-born
foreigner. The views of the two Regents on many sub
jects were often diverse, the interests they represented
often opposed. For, whilst Ximenes may be said to have
championed those of Spain, Adrian s task was to protect
the interests of the youthful Charles, himself a foreigner,
and as yet totally unknown to the Spanish people. Once
more Adrian s good sense and tactfulness, his evident
sanctity of life and honesty of purpose, steered him
through shoals on which many a more promising states
man would have been wrecked. Sometimes Adrian won
over the Cardinal to his views ; at others, by sage con
cessions, he avoided conflicts. For one thing, the two
men had much in common, and were able to live together
as sincere and even intimate friends. Both were ecclesi
astics of great personal piety, both devoted lovers of
theological science. Common tastes and mutual ad
miration for one another s virtue drew them together.
The great Cardinal often invited his Flemish colleague
to his table to discuss with mutual friends their common
studies. Ximenes consulted the experienced Louvain
professor in drawing up the constitutions of his own
University of Alcala, which he had recently founded.

Adrian found a new and powerful friend in the
dowager-queen Germaine, the second wife of the last
King. She wrote to Charles urging him to obtain from
Rome for Adrian the important bishopric of Tortosa.
Ximenes generously seconded her efforts, and Leo X.
conferred upon Adrian the above-named see, one of the
best-endowed in the whole kingdom. Adrian, now
placed in comparative affluence by his Spanish revenues,
at once resigned nearly all the benefices which he had
hitherto held in the Low Countries. Once more it was,
owing to Ximenes influence that the Pope, at Charles s
request, in 1516 nominated the new Bishop of Tortosa
to the important office of Grand Inquisitor of Arragon
and Navarre. In this new and delicate office Adrian
displayed those qualities of gentleness and prudence

120 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

which were all the more needed at the time, as his pre
decessor Deza had been forced to resign through the
public odium excited by his rigour and excessive
severity. Indeed, one of the greatest merits of Adrian
during his stay in Spain was the moderating influence
that he exercised over that dreaded tribunal, which had
become in the hands of the Spanish Kings an instrument
of political, rather than of religious, government.*

Further preferment quickly followed. On June 25 of
the following year (1517) Leo X. created on one day the
unprecedented number of thirty-one Cardinals, f among
them Lorenzo Campeggio, so well known later on in the
affair of the divorce of Henry VIII., and also, on the
special petition of Charles, Adrian of Utrecht.

The letter of Leo to Charles is a high testimony to
Adrian s reputation. " We have very willingly ad
mitted into the College of Cardinals Adrian, Bishop of
Tortosa, on account of his singular knowledge of sacred
sciences, his stainless character, and his eminent virtues ;
also out of condescension for you, and to cause you
great joy, since we have raised to the highest dignity
of the Church a virtuous, learned, and prudent man,
your former master and tutor." Furthermore, the Pope
urges upon Charles as a duty that he should supply the
new Cardinal with means suitable to support his new
dignity, and not leave him " with such limited means,
or, to speak more accurately, in that poverty which has
so long been the companion of his life " a striking tes
timony to Adrian s reputation for frugality and dis
interestedness, which had already made him known in
Rome, though he had never visited that city.

Cardinal Ximenes did not long survive the nomination
of his colleague to the Sacred College. Worn out with

* It is surprising to find Creighton stating that as Inquisitor
Adrian exercised his office with rigour, and even " sharpened "
its methods (p. 224). Exactly the contrary was the case, as
shown in great detail by Lepitre, pp. 155-163. (See also Hofler,
p. ii2, n. 2.)

f And not thirty-nine, as Creighton incorrectly says (p. 223).

THE DUTCH POPE 121

disease, pursued by popular suspicions and calumnies,
slighted and disliked by Charles, the great Cardinal, at
the very moment of the new King s arrival in Spain,
breathed his last, at the age of eighty- two, in the monas
tery of Aguilera, " leaving behind him," says Peter
Martyr, " a glory unequalled in history." " The only
Minister," says Robertson, " whom his contemporaries
have regarded as a saint, and to whom the people
governed by him attributed the power of working-
miracles." His death was a great loss for Spain. Had
he lived longer, to mould and direct the policy of the
new King, that country would have been spared many
miseries. It was high time that the new King should
visit his Spanish subjects, but unfortunately his visit,
entirely under the influence as he was of his unscrupulous
Minister, de Chievres, the old rival and enemy of Adrian,
only led to dissensions and civil war, in which Cardinal
Adrian had later on to play a difficult and most ungrate
ful part.

It would take too long to narrate the miserable bicker
ings and disputes, chiefly concerning money matters,
which marred Charles s sojourn in his new kingdom,
owing largely to the cupidity of his Minister, which led
Charles, as has been said, to treat Spain almost as a
conquered country. The Cortes of Castile, Arragon,
and Catalonia, summoned to recognise the new King
and vote him the customary servicios, or monetary con
tributions, were the cause of still further dissatisfaction.
At this moment, news suddenly arrived from Germany
that the Electors had designated Charles for the Imperial
Crown in succession to his grandfather, and Charles was
only too glad to give effect to their pressing invitation
to. 7 leave at once for Aix-la-Chapelle for his installation.
He hastily delegated Cardinal Adrian to preside in his
name over the Cortes of Valencia, and quitted without
further delay a country for which he cared little, whose
language he would not speak, and for which he did not
conceal his dislike. He left his old master Adrian a

122 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

legacy of serious troubles and dangers. The Cortes of
Valencia showed themselves entirely refractory, and
within a short time of Charles s departure Adrian, now
named Viceroy of Castile, found himself face to face
with a general rising of the kingdom, which rapidly
developed into the terrible civil war of the Comuneros,
in which much blood was shed, and fortune vascillated
from side to side, sometimes in favour of, sometimes
adversely to, the royal authority and arms. During
all this stormy period the Cardinal of Tortosa employed
all his habitual tact and prudence, his natural mildness
and placability ; and when actually forced by circum
stances to take up arms, manifested no less firmness
and decision.* It is instructive and edifying to remark
how, in the midst of all these troubles, Adrian retained
the personal veneration of the Spanish people, in spite
of his foreign origin, and in spite of the powers, uncon
stitutional as they were held to be, which Charles had
conferred upon him. Spanish writers always refer to
him as a holy man a saint. The civil war of the
Comuneros lasted during the years 1520-1521, and were
only ended by the crushing defeat of the rebels at the
Battle of Villaler in the latter year. The Cardinal and
the two colleagues whom Charles had given him in the
government received the submission of all the cities
except Toledo, which still held out for a considerable
time under Dona Maria Pacheco, and the Comuneros
accepted all the conditions imposed upon them by
Charles V., conditions which modern historians con
sider to have compromised the traditional liberties of
Castile, and introduced a royal absolutism which has
had regrettable results in the subsequent history of
Spain. For such results Adrian cannot be blamed.
Faithful to the behests and interests of his royal master,
his influence all through was exercised in the direction

* I do not think Creighton has any justification for his opinion
that Adrian " played a somewhat ignominious part during the
rising ot the Comuneros " (p. 223).

THE DUTCH POPE 123

of moderation and clemency. We may rather pity him
as the victim of the headstrong and tyrannical policy
of Charles and his ill-omened adviser. But internal
troubles were not all that Adrian had to contend with.
He found himself at almost the same time face to face
with the active hostility of France, under the unscrupulous
and ambitious King Francis I. Pursuing his claim to
the kingdom of Navarre, Francis in the spring of 1521
sent his army, under Andre de Foix, to invade that
kingdom. The campaign was rapid and, for a time,
decisive, for in a fortnight Navarre was conquered.
One of its most striking episodes was the siege and
gallant defence of Pampeluna, in which a Guipuzcoan
gentleman, Don Inigo de Loyola, received those serious
wounds which were to change the current of his life,
and make him for ever known as St. Ignatius, the
founder of the Society of Jesus. But the attempt of
the French to push on into Castile was, largely owing
to Adrian s courage and firmness, a failure. The Battle
of Exquiros ended in the rout of the French ; Pampe
luna was retaken, and the French army captured or
scattered. A second French invasion, however, followed
in the winter, though it was of short duration, and the
French once more withdrew. Cardinal Adrian passed
the rest of the winter busily occupied in the administra
tion of Castile.

III. THE POPE ELECT.

In the January of 1522 Adrian was residing in Vitoria.
The winter was one of unusual severity, the excessively
heavy snowfall having rendered the mountains almost
impassable, whilst severe wintry storms swept the sea.
On the 25th Adrian had been to visit his colleague in the
government, the Admiral of Castile, who was confined
to his bed by sickness. As he returned to his home, a
courier, half dead with cold, rushed into his presence,
holding out a letter and crying out : " Holy Father !

124 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Holy Father !" at the same time throwing himself on
his knees and trying to kiss Adrian s feet. The Cardinal
endeavoured to repel him, asking in amazement, " Where
is the Holy Father ?" The stranger answered in Italian,
" Voi, Padre Santo, e non altro !" Adrian, who was not
even aware of the death of Leo X., which had occurred
as far back as December i, opened the despatch, which
proved to be from the Spanish Bishop of Girona, then in
Rome, and learnt the astounding news, not only of the
Pope s death and the subsequent conclave, but also
of his own unanimous election to the Papal See on
January 9. Adrian, with his customary calmness and
without changing colour, turned to his friends and said :
" If the news be true, I am very much to be pitied."*

It gives us some idea of the difficulties of communica
tion in those days to learn that, in the case of such im
portant news as that of the death of a Pope, the holding
of a conclave, and the election of a successor, out of
five messengers sent off to Adrian immediately after his
election, three, who chose the road by land, were stopped
and held captive in France ; a fourth was driven back
by contrary winds to Civita Vecchia, kept there ten
days, and, having sailed again, was driven back by
pirates to Italy, finally arrived at Nice, but was pre
vented from proceeding further by the French ; whilst
of the fifth nothing more was ever heard.

Even towards the end of February Adrian was not
yet sure whether the news of his election was true, and
the Cardinals in Rome were ignorant whether Adrian
was alive or dead ! It was merely by a lucky chance
that the new Pope had received the news on January 25.
A messenger of the Bishop of Girona had succeeded
in bringing it as far as Logrofio, where he communi
cated it in secret, upon which Ortiz, provisor of the
Bishop of Calahora, himself set out for Vitoria, and,
with the greatest danger to his life, managed to make
his way over the snow-covered mountains, and so reached
* Letter of Pace to Wolsey, February 22, 1522.

THE DUTCH POPE 125

the presence of Adrian as we have described. The news
rapidly spread through Vitoria and the neighbourhood.
The inhabitants of all classes crowded to the viceregal
palace to congratulate the new Pope and kiss his feet,
which Adrian endeavoured to prevent, declaring that
the news was by no means certain. At night the streets
were illuminated, and a cavalcade traversed the city to
celebrate the joyful event. Yet Adrian s suspicions
seemed almost justified. Sixteen days passed, and no
official confirmation, of the news arrived. People began
to ask whether the letter of the Bishop of Girona was
not a hoax. It was even suggested that it had been
forged at the Court of Francis I. in order to turn Adrian
into ridicule ; but at last, on February 9, the cameriere
of Cardinal Carvajal, who had succeeded in making his
way through the snow-covered, mountainous roads,
arrived with the official letter from the Sacred College.
Adrian read the document with his accustomed calm,
and, making no comment upon the contents, simply
bade the messenger to go and take the rest which he so
much needed. For some days those around him were
in doubt whether or not he would accept the nomination.
Once more the population crowded in to ask his blessing
or to seek his favour. Adrian, to escape them, took
refuge in the monastery of St. Francis, and continued to
devote himself to the ordinary affairs of State, refusing
to see anybody. Not till the i6th did he, after saying
his Mass, summon his physician and two other atten
dants, and declare to them his decision. Although, he
said, he was well aware of the dangers of so exalted a
position, yet he felt that if he refused the election he
might cause still greater confusion in the Universal
Church. Called by the inscrutable designs of Providence
to this new dignity, he had decided to accept it, relying
on the Divine assistance, and hoping to become a not
unworthy servant of Divine grace. He then gave
instructions for the legal act of acceptance to be drawn
up, though all in the greatest secrecy. Meanwhile,

126 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

however, as early as February 2, Adrian had written
both to King Henry VIII. and to Cardinal Wolsey.
Referring to the rumours of his election, he declared
that he had neither sought nor desired the Papacy.
His strength was insufficient, and he would have declined
it did he not fear to offend God and the Church. In
his letter to the English King he struck what was to be
the keynote of his whole policy Peace. He begged the
King to labour for the restoration of peace in Christen
dom, and for this purpose to come to an understanding
with the Emperor Charles V. The same idea appears in
his letter to Wolsey, whom he designated one of the
pillars of the Church. His first letter to Charles V. is
dated February n. In it he clearly expresses his inten
tion of accepting the election. The tenor of his letter, on
the whole, is much the same as those just quoted.

What Adrian s private sentiments were at this
moment will be clearly gathered from his familiar letter
to his intimate friend, Dr. Florencius Oem, Syndic of
Utrecht :

" There will certainly be no one who will not be sur
prised and annoyed that a poor man, almost unknown
to everybody, and at so great a distance, should have
been unanimously chosen by the Cardinals as the Vicar
of Christ. But for God it is an easy thing suddenly to
exalt the poor man. I am not rejoiced at this honour,
and am afraid to take upon myself so great a burden.
I would much rather, instead of the dignities of Pope,
Cardinal, and Bishop, serve God in my provostship at
Utrecht. But I dare not resist the call of God, and hope
that He will perfect what is wanting in me, and grant
me sufficient strength to bear the burden. I beg you
pray for me, and obtain for me by your pious prayers
that God may teach me how to carry out His com
mandments, and make me worthy to serve the welfare
of His Church/

Similar sentiments of humility appear in other letters

1

THE DUTCH POPE 127

to his personal friends, of whom, in his exalted position,
he never showed himself at all ashamed. " Votre bon
ami et esleu pape " is his homely signature. Writing to
another, he says : " The Prince who sets anything above
his princely good name and the welfare of his subjects
is no Prince, but a tyrant. I myself have learnt to satisfy
myself with common food and little drink, to clothe my
body with cheap garments ; all else, however much it
may be, must be employed for the common weal of
Christendom." Such was the man, humble, earnest,
frugal, unworldly, whom a College of Cardinals, one of
the most worldly, ambitious, luxurious, and mercenary
that Christendom had yet seen, at a time of general
worldliness, pride, dissoluteness, and intrigue, had
unanimously chosen to be the successor of the sump
tuous, ambitious, and worldly-minded Leo X.

Surely here was the finger of the Most High.

This is the place to say something of that extra
ordinary conclave one of the most disgraceful in
history, as it is not unjustly styled in the Cambridge
Modern History* in which this marvellous election
occurred.

Christendom in this first quarter of the sixteenth cen
tury was sick unto death. Ruin and devastation from
without threatened it in the ever-growing power of the
irresistible Turk, whose legions, under the redoubtable
conqueror Suliman II., were thundering at its gates.
Within, Luther and his adherents were kindling those
religious and civil wars that were soon to rend Chris
tianity in twain. The Christian Princes were at bitter
enmity among themselves Charles V. of Germany and
Henry VIII. of England, on the one hand, arrayed
against Francis I. on the other ; the States and cities of
Italy torn by contending factions, Imperialist or French ;
whilst petty Princes were fighting for their own hand,
until the whole peninsula was in a state of inextricable
confusion and hopeless strife. A succession of worldly-
* " The Reformation," vol. ii.

128 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

minded Popes had left behind them a worldly-minded
College of Cardinals, which exemplified all the vices of
the times, and in which were reflected only too faith
fully the varied feuds and jealousies that distracted the
whole of Europe. Most of the Cardinals, Italian Princes
of high rank, were men full of personal ambition, seeking
their own exaltation, greedy of power and wealth,
carrying the internecine feuds of the Medici, the Orsini,
the Colonna, into the sacred precincts of the Church ;
or else creatures and secret agents of the German
Emperor or the French King, all alike blind and deaf to
higher interests and to the welfare of the Bride of Christ.*
The deplorable result was that the conclave which
followed the death of Leo X. was an unprecedented
scene of intrigue, quarrelling and faction, which even
threatened schism in the Church. The various Princes
and States of Europe endeavoured by their agents to
promote the candidature now of one, now of the other,
of the Cardinals. Henry VIII. of England and, secretly,
the Emperor Charles V., supported Cardinal Wolsey.
Clerk, the English Ambassador in Rome, writing to
Wolsey at the time, declared : " I assure your Grace
here is a marvellous division, and we were never likelier
to have a schism "; and again : " The Papacy is in great
decay ; the Cardinals brawl and scold ; their malicious,
unfaithful, and uncharitable demeanour against each
other increases every day."

The conclave opened on December 27, numbering
thirty-nine Cardinals, and lasted till January 9. So
" marvellous," indeed, to use Clerk s words, were these
divisions among them, that after ten scrutinies it seemed
absolutely impossible for any one name to secure the

* Creighton remarks, with some truth, that the large addition
by Leo X. to the Sacred College of men from every State in Europe
made it more amenable to political considerations (p. 214). The
evil beginnings of this corruption of the Sacred College, especially
under the reign of that weak nepotist Sixtus IV., are most
strikingly portrayed in the second volume of Pastor s " History
of the Popes."

THE DUTCH POPE 129

necessary number of votes. At one moment the con
clave was almost in despair, and it seemed as if all must
end in an absolute fiasco. Then a wonderful thing
happened. Cardinal Medici, himself one of the principal
candidates, and all through one of the least scrupulous
intriguers, suddenly arose and proposed the election of
one of the Sacred College, " who was absent from Rome,
but who was a just man " Cardinal Adrian, Bishop of
Tortosa. He was a man almost absolutely unknown to
Rome, and whom but one of the Cardinals had ever
seen. But, wonder of wonders, as if by a sudden inspira
tion, at the eleventh scrutiny Adrian was unanimously
elected. So unexpected, in fact, was this choice that
the Cardinals themselves seemed hardly to realize what
they had done, and none were more astonished than
themselves at their own handiwork. Yet, indeed, it
was not their work. If ever in the history of the
Church there was an evident and almost visible inter
position of the Holy Ghost, setting at nought the
follies and intrigues of men, it was in the election of
Adrian VI.

The news was received by the people of Rome with
amazed incredulity, succeeded by indignation and rage.
As the first of the Cardinals left the conclave, he was
received in the front of the Vatican Palace by a mob
of 6,000 persons, howling, yelling, and hissing. Dis
graceful scenes occurred all over the city ; men and
women hooted the Cardinals wherever they appeared.
The next day Pasquino was posted over with the
bitterest squibs, sonnets, and lampoons. The Cardinals
were declared " betrayers of the Blood of Christ," and
covered with every species of outrage. The Romans
were furious that no Italian had been elected, but a low
born, obscure foreigner, whom they already dubbed a
" barbarian." Yet the Cardinals were themselves as
much distressed and alarmed at the result as the Roman
mob. " They had done," says one writer, " not what
they wished to do, but what they were obliged to do,

9

130 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

and therein was their rightful chastisement."* " The
election of the Pope," wrote the Swiss Cardinal Schiner
to Cardinal Wolsey, " was the work of the Holy Spirit,
whose dictates we are all bound to obey." But the work
once done could not be undone. Wherefore the Sacred
College determined, as the newly- elected Pope was still
absent, to make things as comfortable as possible for
themselves by dividing amongst themselves all the
various lucrative posts and the governorship of the
cities and territories in the Papal States, besides drawing
up quite a long list of conditions and requisitions
(" capitulations ") to be imposed, if possible, upon the
new Pope, so as to fetter his independent action, and, as
has been said, to turn his Papal monarchy into an
oligarchy, j" How far they succeeded the sequel will
show.

The news was received throughout the rest of Europe
with varied feelings. The French especially King
Francis I. were furious. They looked upon Adrian as
an " Imperialist," and his election as their own defeat
and the triumph of the Germans. Even a French
schism seemed not unlikely. Henry VIII. and Wolsey
were, of course, greatly disappointed at the latter s
failure. The Low Countries were wild with enthusiasm
at the election of their countryman. The news reached
Brussels on January 18, whilst Charles V. was hearing
Mass in the Church of Ste. Gudule. The Emperor
opened the despatch, read it, and, turning to the by
standers, said : " Master Adrian is made Pope." All
the bells in the city were rung ; joyful processions and
bonfires and a solemn High Mass in Ste. Gudule ex
pressed the popular satisfaction. Spain was no less
nattered and delighted. The good were everywhere
rejoiced. All Christendom felt that the election had
contravened all political combinations, and put to

* Hofler, p. 96.

f " The Cardinals felt themselves a powerful aristocracy,"
remarks Creighton, p. 214.

THE DUTCH POPE 131

shame all worldly calculations. " Thy absolutely blame
less life hath alone raised thee to the highest position
in human affairs," wrote Vives, full of enthusiasm.
" Thou hast shown that there is still a place for virtue,
and men s minds have not yet lost all consideration for
it. The lives of preceding Popes have brought it about
that the highest dignity on earth receives fresh lustre
from thy own person." " This is the day of the Lord !"
cried out William Van Enkenvoert. " We have a Pope
who has been elected without any canvassing and in his
absence. No better, no more blameless, no holier Pope
can be found, or even desired." " We have a Pope,"
says another contemporary, " who is a father of all
goodness, a fountain of all doctrine, the glory of learning,
the patron of the learned." Even his enemies and
critics had to bear testimony to his virtues and spotless
life.

It was only likely and many historians have taken
the fact for granted that Adrian should have been
supposed to owe his election to the influence of his
old pupil and actual Sovereign, Charles V. And when
the election was made known, that Monarch and his
Ministers endeavoured to make capital out of so probable
a belief, and to inculcate it as a fact upon the mind of the
Pope himself. But Adrian was too keen and too well
informed to give credit to the claim, and there is docu
mentary evidence in abundance to show that in this
matter Charles played no very honourable part, but
rather that of an astute dissembler. For before the
election he was secretly pledged up to the hilt to support
an entirely different candidate Cardinal Wolsey ; and
there is everything to show that the name of his Viceroy
in Spain never even occurred to him as a likely candidate
for the tiara, but that the election took him completely
by surprise. As soon as Charles learnt of the death of
Leo X., he took steps to carry out his promises towards
Wolsey. On December 28 he wrote to the latter :

92

132 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

" Monsieur le Cardinal, Mon bon amy, vous saves les
devises que autrefois vous ai tenues de ce que voudrais
faire pour vous. A vises ce que pourray, et me les
faites savoir, car je m y emploiray de tres-bon cceur."
Richard Pace, sent by Henry VIII. to Rome to support
the candidature of the Cardinal of York, called upon
Charles at Ghent, who gave him a letter for his ambas
sador, Don Juan Manuel, in Rome, in which he said :
" We have written to the Sacred College, and to several
Cardinals in particular, to exhort them to give to the
Christian commonwealth the Pontiff who shall appear
the best suited. ... In our judgment, the Cardinal of
York is the man most worthy of this high pastoral office.
. . . Do, therefore, with diligence and dexterity . . .
all that may be necessary to arrive at this desirable end."
And at the same time, writing again to Wolsey himself :
" Vous pouvez estre sehur qu il ne sera riens epargne pour
parvenir a 1 effect desire, et ne m a point semble convenable
d escripre en faveur d autre que vous, car toute mon
affection est a vous." And to Henry VIII. on Decem
ber 27 : " Par quoy incontinent que ay sceu votre
intention et la sienne ( Wolsey s), ay depeche sur ce
mes lectres paten tes en la meilleure forme que 1 hon
a sceu devise pour promouvoir le dit seigneur Car
dinal aussis que en cest affere tant que en moy sera,
n espargneray chose quelcunque pour la conduire en bon
effect."

When the intrigues of Charles V. and his Minister,
Don Juan Manuel, had failed, every effort was made by
them to induce Adrian to believe that his election had
been their work only. Don Juan wrote to the new
Pope on January n to the effect that in his election
" the will of the Emperor had coincided with the will
of God " (!). He goes on to give the Pope a very large
dose of advice as to his future conduct of affairs. In
one curious detail Adrian followed the Spanish ambas
sador s advice ; it was in retaining his own baptismal
name as Pope, contrary to the custom which had been

THE DUTCH POPE 133

invariable for many centuries. Hence it was that
Adrian of Utrecht became Pope Adrian VI., the last
instance on record of such a departure from the tra
ditional practice, which is said to date from A.D. 956,
when Ottaviano Conti on his election took the title of
John XII.

Charles V. himself wrote to the Cardinals to thank them
for an election by which they had " shown their piety
towards God, and their benevolence towards himself."
He sent his ambassador, de la Chaulx, to venerate
the new Pope in his name, and instructed him to declare
that he " could not desire a choice more worthy, more
suitable to the service of our Lord, and the prosperity
of His Universal Church, than that which had been made
by the grace of the Holy Ghost." And later on, in a
letter of March 7, he tries hard to persuade Adrian of the
falsity of the reports (which were perfectly true, we
have seen) that his ambassador Manuel had supported
any other candidature : " Je ne sc.auroye croire qu ainsi
fust, ne que Votre Sainctete deust adj ouster foy a une
chose si contraire a verite . . . mais soyez asseure que
jay este cause de votre dite ellection, et en ay eu austant
plesir et joye que si elle m eust este donnee avec mon
empyre." Adrian, in his very courteous and friendly
reply, accepts all the Emperor s assurances of joy and
friendship : " et me suis toujours tenu pour asseure
que si, par vostre pure affection et entiere amour, vous
seul eussiez deubt eslire ung pape, vous fussiez incline^
vers moy et m eussies donne vostre vot." But a few
lines lower down, in the quiet manner peculiar to him
self, Adrian clearly gives the Emperor to understand
that he knew exactly what had happened, and how
little Charles or his ambassador could take credit for
the result. " Je suis toutesfois joyeux non estre parvenu
a V election par vos prieres, pour la purete et sincerite
que les droits divins et humains requierent en semblables
affaires. Je vous en S9ay neantmoinsjaussibon gre
ou meilleur, que si par vostre moyen et prieres vous me

134 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

1 eussiez impetre." Adrian had seen clean through the
duplicity of Charles and his Minister, and did not
conceal the fact from them.

In all this matter Charles s conduct shows but little
to his credit.

But Adrian checkmated his wily pupil in other matters.
Charles jumped to the conclusion that the new Pope
would be his man, and that he would easily be able to
make use of him and the vast influence of the Holy See
as an all-powerful weapon against Francis I. and France.
Like his famous predecessor Frederic II., he had much
to say about the " Unity of the Papacy and the Empire."
He spoke of the Pontiff as of a person " whom he
thought he could command as one brought up in his
household." Writing to Adrian on March 7, he let it
appear pretty plainly that he counted on the Pope to
help him in confounding the designs of the French
King : " J ay esperance que a ce cop ma requeste ne me
sera refusee ny dylaiee, et que ferez plus a ma requeste
que a celle de nul prince chretien, de craint que aucun
savangast de vouloir mener quelque pratique entre
vous et le roy de France, et que par leurs doulces
parolles vous cuidassent endormir." In his instructions
to his Minister de la Chaulx, Charles had the audacious
impiety to suggest that a triple league between the
Pope, the Emperor, and the King of England might be
likened to a Trinity, in which Adrian should be the
Father, Charles the Son, and Henry VIII. the Holy
Ghost (!).

The new Pope was too wise and too righteous to fall
into the Imperial snare. He did not hesitate to refuse
one or two favours asked from him by Charles. He
declined to take sides with the latter against Francis I. ;
on the contrary, he strove to enter into friendly relations
with the French King, and wrote at once to him, to his
mother, and to his sister, and in spite of much suspicion
and unwillingness on the French side, succeeded in
moderating at least to some extent the hostile views

THE DUTCH POPE 135

of the King. Adrian s cry in all this correspondence
with Charles, with Francis, with Henry, with Venice,
and the other Italian States was " Peace, Peace !" He
longed to come forward in the capacity of a Prince of
Peace. His great hope and desire was to induce the
three great rival Sovereigns of Germany, France, and
England to agree, if not to a permanent peace and
alliance, at least to an armistice of two or three years,
and to common action against the ever-growing dangers
of the Turkish invasion of Europe. And all through
his brief pontificate this was one of the chief pre
occupations of his policy.

IV. THE SOVEREIGN OF ROME.

Although Adrian received the official news of his
election on February 9, it was not until July 10 that he
was able to take ship from the Spanish coasts. There
were many reasons for this extraordinary delay. One
was the difficulty of obtaining ships to escort the
Pontiff and his suite across the Mediterranean. Strange
as it seems to us, all kinds of reasons, chiefly political,
interfered with the plans that were successively proposed
for setting the Pope across the waters that divided
Spain and Italy. At one time there was a possibility
of his going overland through France, but the Pope and
his counsellors dared not trust themselves to the mercy
of the French King, however fair his words. To cross
the sea, it must be remembered, was no easy matter.
Not only during the wintry season was the voyage often
rendered impossible by terrible storms, but at all seasons
a strong naval escort was required, for the waters were
infested by the constant raids of corsairs and pirates,
who often threatened the very coasts of Italy ; and even
the presence of the French vessels was itself a danger.
Negotiations were carried on at one time with Venice,
at another time with the Emperor, or with other Powers

136 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

to supply the needed fleet. At one time it was even
seriously proposed by the Imperial party that Adrian
should sail to England, and thence, via Flanders and
Germany, make his way overland to Italy. With his
usual prudence Adrian refused all these combinations.
Yet time dragged slowly on. The Romans began to
fear that the Pope would never leave Spain, and that
a second " Avignon captivity " would ensue. Mean
while the Pontiff pursued the calm and even tenor of
his way. The three Cardinal-legates who had been
deputed to go to Spain, formally salute the Pontiff and
escort him to the Eternal City, still tarried in Rome,
and, as a matter of fact, only one of them, Cardinal
Cesarini, ever crossed to Spain. In March Adrian,
passing through various Spanish cities, made his way,
amid demonstrations of universal veneration, to the
city of Saragossa, where he abode from March 29 to
June n, and whence, for a good part of three months,
he governed the Church. During this long stay at
Saragossa he received the homage, one by one, of all
the Christian States by means of their ambassadors.
He himself was not rich enough to provide a sufficient
number of galleys to undertake the voyage, which he
longed to accomplish, to his own capital. Finally he
reached the sea-coast at Ampolla, whence, on July 10,
he set sail for Tarragona, where he had again to wait
until August 5. On the evening of the latter day, after
vespers, with a large squadron of fifty sail, and accom
panied by his suite and a number of the representatives
of the various Powers, he set sail on his long and slow
voyage. He touched at Barcelona, then, passing
through French waters in the Gulf of Narbonne, he
passed Antibes and Marseilles, touched at Nice and
Villefranche (August 13), where he received the salu
tations of the French King through his secretary, then
on to Porto Marino and Savona, and on August 17 the
thunder of cannon announced his arrival at Genoa ;
finally, on August 26, he first reached his own territory

THE DUTCH POPE 137

at Civita Vecchia, one hundred and sixty-nine days after
he had left his residence at Vitoria. On the very same
day on which the Pope first set foot on his own territory
(August 27) the Lutheran faction in Germany began the
civil war which was destined to last for so many years
and to cause so much misery. A number of Cardinals,
representatives of the Roman nobles, and many Bishops
hastened to meet the Pontiff. The Cardinals tried to
dissuade him from proceeding to Rome, where at this
moment the plague was raging ; but Adrian, with his
usual calm determination, and in spite of a furious
storm which broke out, again betook himself to his galley,
leaving a great part of his suite and luggage behind,
and reached the mouth of the Tiber at Ostia. He found
the shore crowded with Cardinals, Bishops, nobles,
scholars, and knights to welcome him. So great was
his eagerness to reach the Eternal City that towards
evening of the same day the Pope and Cardinals mounted
their horses, and, hastening towards Rome, arrived the
same day (August 28) outside the city, and took up their
abode at the sanctuary of San Paolo fuori le Mura. So
rapid had been his movements that everything was in
confusion. Cardinals and people alike had quickly to
grow accustomed to the new Pope s calm decision and
determination of character, as well as to his simplicity
of life and speech ; they had indeed found their lord
and master. The following day he was up by six o clock
and said Mass as usual, and during the forenoon he
received the solemn homage of the Sacred College in
the magnificent basilica of St. Paul. Here he listened
to a tedious address from Cardinal Caravajal, who
endeavoured to lay down for him a programme of
action and policy. Adrian s reply, as usual, was short,
simple, and practical. He referred briefly to certain
abuses which he desired to see reformed, summarily
refused a number of favours and privileges asked for by
various persons, and, in spite of the burning sun, towards
evening mounted his mule and began his entry in

138 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

solemn procession to the holy city. Passing the little
chapel where SS. Peter and Paul are said to have taken
leave of each other on the day of their martyrdom, by
the Porta di San Paolo and the Aventine, the mag
nificent cavalcade the Pope carrying the Blessed
Sacrament and surrounded by the Swiss Guard
wended its way through the plague-stricken city, by the
Ghetto and the Campo dei Fiori, on to the Vatican.
The houses were decorated with tapestry, a triumphal
arch spanned the street ; the clergy of the city met
him, singing the Te Deum. At St. Peter s Adrian
dismounted, threw himself on both knees on the thresh
old, and then proceeding to the altar of the Confession,
once more received the obedience of the Cardinals. The
whole city was in an uproar of jubilation ; cries of joy
drowned the thunder of the cannon ; women wept, and
the populace, decimated by plague and famine, cried
out " Adriano ! Adriano !" as though their deliverer
had come. On Sunday, August 31, the solemn crowning
took place at St. Peter s. It was remarked that the
Pope, now sixty-four years of age, read the prayers
without glasses, and an eye-witness declares that who
soever saw the angelic countenance of the Pope and
heard his melodious voice must have felt that some
thing Divine rather than human was here. Then
followed the customary banquet, after which the Pope
spoke of his plans for completing the Church of St. Peter,
and of reforming the Rota, the supreme tribunal of
Rome. A curious little instance of the influence of
Adrian s example is that all the Cardinals except two
at once shaved off their beards, which they had been
accustomed to wear under the preceding Pontiff.
" Never," wrote Campeggio to Wolsey, " had there been
greater joy than at Adrian s entrance. All concluded
from his expression, his words, his manner, that he
would be an excellent Pope. All were astonished that
at his age he bore so well the fatigues and excitements
of the past few days." Thus did Adrian VI. enter upon
his short but well-filled administration of the Holy See.

THE DUTCH POPE 139

V. THE REFORMER.

One word sums up the leading idea of that administra
tion reform. Never perhaps had there been a time
when the Church and her clergy, especially the higher
clergy, were more in need of reform. Luther and his
partisans had raised, under the name of reform, which
was in the mouths and the hearts of all earnest thinkers,
the standard of religious and civil revolt, and were setting
the North of Europe ablaze. But the true reform of
the Church was to come, as ever, from within, and
Adrian VI., himself of Teutonic blood, like Luther, was
the first, during the short year of pontificate that
remained to him, to begin that great religious reforma
tion which culminated in the Council of Trent, and of
which we are all enjoying to-day the spiritual benefits.
Truly had the election of Adrian been the work of
Divine Providence.

We cannot pretend to narrate in full the complete
history of his short but ever memorable reign. We
must, however, briefly touch upon four chief questions
which occupied the remaining months of his strenuous
and indefatigable pontificate the reform of the Church,
the protection of Europe against the Turkish peril, the
defence of the Church against Lutheranism, and the
international feud between Charles V. and Francis I.

We have said that the word reform was in all hearts
and mouths. At this very time secret spiritual forces
were at work in the Church herself that were to be
the Divine means of working out this reformation.
St. Jerome Emilian was laying the foundation of the
Order of the Somaschi ; three Italian noblemen, that of
the Barnabites ; Ignatius of Loyola had just completed
his long retreat at Manresa, where he conceived the
plan of his famous Company of Jesus ; St. Gaetano
was exercising his zeal in Rome, and about to establish
his Congregation of the Theatines. The pious Cardinal

140 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Egidio of Viterbo submitted to Adrian, perhaps at the
latter s own request, an elaborate project of reform,
nearly all of which the Pope adopted. These reforms
had reference to abuses in benefices, indults, conces
sions and indulgences ; concordats with Princes,
the administration of justice, the government of the
Papal States, the extravagant expenditure which had
burdened the Papal treasury. One of Adrian s first
acts, and it was a drastic one, was to annul all the
"provisions " that had been made by the Sacred College
in his absence. So radical a measure provoked many
murmurs ; but Adrian was not the man to be dis
quieted by them. He published new laws of the Papal
Chancellery, which he had elaborated some time before,
and by which he regulated the collation of benefices.*
More especially did Adrian suppress with all severity
that great curse of the Church under so many of his
predecessors nepotism. Adrian himself set the ex
ample in his own case, and sternly refused to confer
honours and benefices on those of his own kin. The
revocation of indults left vacant, it is said, nearly
5,000 benefices, and Adrian employed himself actively
in providing these with worthy and deserving in
cumbents.

Rome and the Curia itself were among the first objects
of Adrian s reforming zeal. He found the Holy See
heavily laden with debt owing to the extravagance and
luxury of Leo X., who did not even leave enough to
pay for his own funeral. Rigid economy now became
the order of the day. The ranks of court officials and
servants were considerably reduced. The hundred
grooms who had served Leo X. begged to be taken again
into service. Adrian replied that four were quite
enough for himself, and was with great difficulty per
suaded to take on twelve. Naturally enough these
retrenchments caused much discontent in the city, and

* These rules, published at Antwerp 1522, are now exceedingly
rare.

THE DUTCH POPE 141

tended to procure for Adrian the reputation of avarice.
Yet when he died only 3,000 ducats were found in his
coffers.

The Pope himself set the example of personal fru
gality, and continued just the same kind of life as he
had led at Louvain. An eye-witness, Luigi Gradenigo,
Venetian Ambassador, wrote of him :

" Pope Adrian VI., who has refused to change his
name, leads an exemplary and devout life. Every day
he says the canonical hours ; he rises during the night
to say Matins, and then returns to bed to take a little
sleep ; before dawn he rises again to say Mass, and then
gives audiences. He dines and sups very frugally, and
spends, it is said, but one ducat for his meals. He is of
good and holy life, and sixty-one years old.* He is
slow in deciding, and acts with much circumspection.
He is learned in Holy Scripture, speaks little, and loves
solitude."

Other Venetian ambassadors confirm this description
point by point, adding that, when asked any request
or decision, great or small, his invariable answer is
Videbimus, " We will see."

" He gives a good deal of time every day to study, for,
not content with reading, he still wishes to write and
compose, and thus distracts himself from the cares of
the pontificate. His day is largely occupied with exer
cises of piety, study, and needed repose, so that it is
not possible to give many audiences. . . . They say
that his daily expenditure for meals is a ducat, which he
takes every evening from his pocket, and gives secretly
to his majordomo, saying : Here is for to-morrow s
expenses. His meals consist of veal, beef, or chicken.
Sometimes he has a thick soup ; on abstinence days he
lives on fish ; but of everything he eats with moderation.
A woman from his own country cooks and washes for
him, and makes his bed."

These homely details of a simple life must have
* This is incorrect ; he was past sixty-four.

142 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

appeared a strange contrast indeed to the extravagant
luxuries of the princely Court of a Leo X. ; they excited
ridicule and dislike, for they were a silent reproach
to many of the clergy of the Eternal City. His love of
learning was another useful lesson to his contemporaries.
" He could not bear an ignorant priest," writes Girolamo
Negro. His only amusement was gardening.

Yet simple and frugal in his own life, he could be
magnificent when his duties as a Sovereign required it.
The poor idolized him and crowded round him, as, alone
on foot, he traversed the streets of Rome. He was the
first Pope to repair the Roman aqueducts.

Still his unpopularity among the higher classes, and
especially in the world of secular learning and art,
steadily grew. Pasquino was often covered with
bitter epigrams directed against the saintly Pontiff. In
one of these it was said that Rome had always been
ruined by a " Sextus " (Sextus Tarquinius, Sextus Nero,
Adrianus VI.).* At one time Adrian was disposed to
break up both statues, Pasquino and Marforio, and throw
them in the Tiber, but was dissuaded by a witty ambas
sador. Adrian was certainly the bete-noire of the
humanists and the poets of his day. They loved to
represent him as a " barbarian " and the enemy of
learning. This charge was unjust. Adrian was no
enemy of good letters. He had been years before one
of the supporters of Busleiden in establishing his
celebrated Trilingual College of Humanities at Louvain. j*
He maintained his friendship with Erasmus, and as
Pope urgently pressed him to come and settle in Rome.
Erasmus declined in a curiously artificial and exag
gerated letter, in which he declared he could not stand
the snow of the Alps, the odour of Italian cookery, and
the sourness of the wines ! There is no doubt, however,
that Adrian keenly realized the abuses and dangers of

* " Sextus Tarquinius, Sextus Nero, Sextus et iste :

Semper et a Sextis diruta Roma fuit."
t See later, Article VII.

THE DUTCH POPE 143

the Renascence movement. The exaggerations of
humanism had led to a paganizing even of Christianity
itself. Many of the leading humanists distinguished
themselves by indecent and even obscene writings ;
and the undue importance attached to the pagan
literatures and philosophies had caused a widespread
neglect of theology. Adrian s ambition, like that of
Leo XIII. , seems to have been to bring about a Renas
cence of Christian philosophy and theology as a means
of meeting the intellectual dangers which threatened
the Faith then as now.

It is true that, with his practical and serious turn of
mind, Adrian seems to have lacked the love of art for
art s sake, and also the appreciation of poetry. Hence
artists and poets, who had enjoyed an elysium at the
Court of Leo X.,* found no patronage under his austere
successor. No wonder that the poets were the Pontiff s
bitterest enemies, and attacked him with vehement
scurrility. The bitterest of all was Berni, whose out
rageous invective is yet a testimony to Adrian s virtue,
for he incidentally styles him " a saintly Pope, who
says Mass every morning."

We may well say, with Erasmus, that ten years of
such a pontificate would have changed the face of
Rome and Italy.

VI. THE WATCHMAN OF CHRISTENDOM.!

Long before his departure for Italy Adrian s mind
was preoccupied with the Turkish danger which

* Yet Professor Kraus, in his chapter on " Medicean Rome "
in the Cambridge Modern History (vol. ii., " The Reformation "),
questions seriously whether Leo X., the patron of Raffaele, was
a true eiicourager of the arts.

f It will doubtless strike many readers how much similarity
there existed between the aims and aspirations, as well as the
disappointments and troubles, of Adrian VI. and those of his
predecessor Pius II. in the preceding century, as so vividly de
picted by Pastor in his classical " History of the Popes "; and
this in spite of the great dissimilarity of personal character and
history.

144 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

threatened all Europe. Christendom was distracted
with internal jealousies and dissensions, and seemed
heedless of the growing power of the terrible Suliman II.
The Pope alone was on the watch-tower, solicitous for
the common weal of Europe. This was one of the chief
motives of his constant appeal for " peace " in all his
correspondence or negotiations with Christian States
and Princes. He longed to unite them in a common
league of defence, as in the old Crusading days, and to
turn back by their united arms the Moslem tide of
conquest. But his efforts were all in vain. Fair words
and promises were all he could obtain. Charles V. and
Francis I. were implacable in their mutual hostility ;
Henry VIII. was bound to Charles ; Venice s commercial
interests in being free to carry on her trade with the
East made her unwilling to break with the Turk : she
was even accused of secretly abetting the Moslem.
Meantime Suliman was gathering together vast naval
and military forces, and nobody knew what would be
his first point of attack. At last, in the summer of 1522,
all Europe learnt that the Sultan with his forces was
investing the island of Rhodes, then held by the gallant
Order of the Knights Hospitallers of St. John. In vain
did the heroic defenders call on the Pope and the Princes
of Europe to come to their succour ; in vain did Adrian
redouble his efforts to bring about at least a temporary
truce in Europe, so as to enable the Christian States to
send aid to the little band of Christian knights hard
pressed by all the legions of the Great Sultan. Charles
refused point blank ; Genoa made a feeble effort to
send a couple of vessels ; there was no hope from any
earthly power. All that year the terrible siege dragged
on. The heroic defence of Rhodes, under the Grand-
Master Villiers de I fie- Adam, is one of the golden pages
of history. More than once Suliman was actually on the
point of abandoning the attack. The intrepid heroism of
the Knights of St. John excited the genuine admiration
of the Moslem ; and when at last, after enduring unheard

THE DUTCH POPE 145

of hardships and displaying superhuman valour, the
Grand-Master found himself obliged to capitulate on
Christmas Day, the Sultan accorded the most honourable
terms. The Knights were allowed to leave unmolested
with their arms and baggage, and any Christians who
liked to follow them, to Candia ; to the inhabitants of
Rhodes the free exercise of their religion was guaranteed.
On the first day of 1523 the Christian fleet set sail for
Candia. The heroic Villiers de 1 lie- Adam and his
Knights wished to visit Adrian VI., and place them
selves at his disposal. But when they reached Italy
the Pope was lying on his sick-bed and unable to
receive them. He assigned them Civita Vecchia as a
residence, and it was the Knights of St. John to whom
was confided the care of the conclave in which
Clement VII. was elected. Later on Charles V. granted
them the island of Malta, where they remained till
dispossessed by Napoleon I.

The impression made upon Adrian by the fall of
Rhodes was a deeply painful one. It was remarked
that he was never cheerful again. Whenever he spoke
of it tears filled his eyes.

Adrian s preoccupation for the defence of Christendom
from the external perils of the Moslem invasion did not
in any way interfere with the anxieties concerning the
internal perils which threatened it from the Lutheran
revolt in the North of Europe. His election coincided
with the rapid growth of Lutheranism, and Adrian, who
was as convinced as Luther of the urgent necessity of a
reform in the clergy, whether in Germany or in Italy,
was clear-sighted enough to perceive that Luther s
so-called Reformation was as much a political as a
religious movement, and that it threatened both the
political and social, as much as the religious, disinte
gration of Christianity. To a large extent it was a
continuation of the old feud of the Guelphs and the
Ghibellines, and when Luther, in his coarse diatribes,
called upon the German people to reject the Pope

10

146 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

because he was Antichrist, he was exploiting the
national tendency of the Teutonic race to enfranchise
itself from an authority which to them was " ultramon
tane " or foreign. Luther had the talent to excite the
German nobles against Rome and the Emperor, and at
the same time to excite the people against their Princes.
A recent critic of the Cambridge Modern History, com
menting on Professor Pollard s account of the Reforma
tion in Germany, writes : " Luther does not cut a heroic
figure in his relations with the democratic movement of
the peasants against the Princes, and (quoting Pollard s
own words) from the position of national hero now
sank to be the prophet of a sect, and a sect which
depended for existence upon the support of political
powers. With the exception of Duke George of
Saxony, the German Princes seemed blind to the dangers
which threatened them. Some, like the Archbishop-
Elector of Mainz, were timid, and feared a condemnation
of Luther at the Diet of Worms ; others, like the
Elector Frederick of Saxony, openly favoured the
innovator. The secular Princes also were not sorry to
emancipate themselves from the authority of the
Emperor and to seize upon ecclesiastical property, as
Luther encouraged them to do. At this time robbery
and spoliation of convents and benefices was called by
that name of " secularization " that has been found so
convenient a term even in our own times. Adrian was
in season and out of season in his efforts to open the
eyes of the German Princes, by his able letters and
despatches, to the growing danger. These documents
are remarkable both for the firmness of their tone and
the solidity of their arguments. He describes in
graphic terms the evils already wrought by Luther s
preaching the churches abandoned ; the people in
revolt against their clergy ; a portion of the clergy seduced
and unfaithful to their vocation ; the Sacraments des
pised, Christians dying without confession ; and the
clarion of civil discord re-echoing throughout Germany,

THE DUTCH POPE 147

summoning the populace to pillage, murder, and fire ;
nuns drawn out of their convents ; the priests of Christ
induced to violate their vows and contract marriage ;
and all obedience, both secular and religious, trodden
under foot. But all his efforts remained sterile.
Charles V. himself would take no active part in suppress
ing the evil except on conditions of monetary advantage
to himself. He desired the Pope to authorize him to
retain for his own use the annates, and to impose for
his own benefit tithes on the cathedrals, the collegiate
churches, the monasteries, and even the houses of the
mendicant Orders, under the pretext of using them for
the war against the Turks. Adrian was too prudent
to grant these requests, and the Diet which assembled
at Nuremberg, perhaps partly owing to the incapacity
and imprudence of the Papal Legate, Francesco
Cheregato, entirely failed to produce those results
which Adrian desired. Soon after the " Centum
Gravimina " appeared in Germany, according to some
the work of the Diet itself,* according to others, more
probably that of Luther, or some of his adherents. This
document ridicules Purgatory and the cult of the Saints,
calumniates the mendicant Orders, demands the suppres
sion of ecclesiastical feasts, condemns the consecration
of churches, cemeteries, and bells, and many other
sacred rites, as so many superstitions. Luther was
triumphant ; he felt that his cause was gained. He
poured forth with more than usual scurrility attacks
upon the Pope and his letters, which he called " truly
Papistical, monkish, and Louvanian." Adrian could
not but feel that, in spite of his conciliatory words, he
had failed on all points. He resolved as a last and
supreme resource to summon an (Ecumenical Council,
which the Lutherans had long demanded, and for
which Catholics like the celebrated Louis Vives were

* So Creighton : " The Lay Estates brought forward the
Hundred Grievances " (p. 262), and thinks " this was no token
of sympathy with Luther s opinions."

102

148 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

pleading. But death prevented his carrying his great
project into execution. It was reserved for a later
pontificate to realize Adrian s design in the great
Council of Trent. In 1523 Adrian canonized two illus
trious saints the great Dominican, St. Antoninus,
Archbishop of Florence, and St. Benno, whose memory
is venerated all through Saxony.* Luther replied by
one of his most infamous libels, entitled, " Against the
New Idol and the Old Devil who is to be glorified in
Misnia."

One more project which Adrian VI. had deeply at
heart was also destined to failure, partly owing to the
duplicity of his own pupil Charles, still more to the
implacable hostility of Francis I. We have already
seen the untiring efforts made by Adrian from the very
moment of his nomination to bring about a reconciliation
between Francis I. on the one hand and Charles V. and
Henry VIII. on the other, or at least to induce them to
consent to a truce of temporary duration. We have
also seen the insidious efforts of Charles to involve
Adrian in a common alliance with himself and Henry
against the French King, and we have noted the
steady refusal of the clear-sighted and just Pontiff,
who felt himself in reality the common Father of
Christendom, to allow himself to be cajoled into becom
ing the cat s-paw of the wily Emperor. Adrian spared
no efforts to secure the goodwill of Francis I., but, at
the close of his brief pontificate, what the diplomacy of
Charles had failed to obtain was brought about by the
injustice and violence of the French King himself.
Already Charles and Henry, the latter probably in
fluenced by Cardinal Wolsey, whom Adrian seems to
have won over, appeared disposed to listen to the Pope s
propositions of peace. But Francis s unjustifiable
arrest of the Papal Nuncio in France, which was a viola
tion of international law, his recall of his own ambas-

* Creighton, oddly enough, calls this the canonization " of two
German Bishops " (!) (p. 273).

THE DUTCH POPE 149

sador from Rome, and his evident determination once
more to invade Italy and renew all the miseries of war
in that ill-fated country, finally drove Adrian to abandon
his neutrality and conclude a defensive league with the
Emperor, the King of England, the Archduke Ferdinand
of Austria, the Duke of Milan, and the republics of
Florence, Genoa, Siena, and Lucca. That of Venice
acceded to the league under certain reserves. Even as
it was, an opportunity was left for the headstrong
French King himself to enter the league upon certain
conditions. Francis, however, declined to accede to
this treaty of peace, and began his preparations for the
invasion of Italy. Adrian was already taking active
steps to provide for the defence of Italy when death put
an end to his career.

VII. " MAGIS OSTENSUS QUAM DATUS."

On the very day (April 3, 1523) on which the inter
national league was solemnly published in the Church of
St. Mary Major, Adrian, who had been for a long time
unwell, was taken seriously ill. Rome at the time was
in a most unhealthy condition. The plague, which had
raged in 1522, broke out again with renewed virulence
in the summer of 1523. In spite of this, Adrian con
tinued to reside in the city, in order to restore the courage
of the Roman people. Ill as he was, he occupied the last
few months of his life with his wonted restless activity.
Touched by the entreaties of King Louis of Hungary,
whose States were already being invaded by the con
quering Turk, the Pope, by a great effort and at the
sacrifice of many jewels, silver-plate, and precious
objects, succeeded in raising a sum of 50,000 ducats,
which he despatched to Hungary to furnish resources
against the Turks. For the same purpose, he sent large
provisions of corn and gunpowder to the frontiers of
Croatia and Dalmatia, which were in the greatest peril.
But the Papal solicitude extended to far-distant parts

150 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

of the world. He conferred upon the Franciscan mis
sionaries special powers and privileges for the work
of evangelization in Central and Southern America. He
took much interest also in the welfare of the Order of
the Dominicans, establishing, among others, a home of
the Friars Preachers at Elgin in Scotland. He interested
himself in the Eastern Church, and had the consolation
of receiving the letters of Theophilus, the schismatic
Patriarch of Alexandria, begging to be readmitted into
communion with the Roman Church. On Palm Sunday
he received in audience Ignatius of Loyola, who came to
beg his blessing on the pilgrimage he was about to
undertake to the Holy Land.

Meanwhile his sickness grew rapidly worse, and as the
summer wore to its close he felt that his last hour was
swiftly approaching. On September 8 he summoned
the Cardinals round his bed, and announced to them his
desire of raising to the cardinalate his faithful friend
and countryman, William Enkenvoert, the only Cardinal
whom he created during his reign. It is a striking
instance of his simplicity and uprightness of character
that he also begged the Cardinals consent to his be
queathing to his relations in the Low Countries such
movable property as he had brought with him from
Spain.* " This is enough," said he, " to relieve their
poverty and future necessities. I have not wished to
enrich them with benefices or with the goods of the
Church, and I desire that my successors should imitate
me " words which recall those of another Adrian, the
English Pope. He then charged Cardinal Enkenvoert
to dispose of all his property in Louvain and Utrecht for
pious works, among these chiefly the endowment of the
college he had founded at the Flemish University.
Lastly, he begged that his funeral might be one of the

* The " hideous scene," as Creighton calls it, made by the
Cardinals around Adrian s deathbed, narrated by the Duke of
Sessa, is discredited by Hofler (p. 536, n. 5). Nor is there any
truth in the rumour of Adrian s having been poisoned.

THE DUTCH POPE 151

greatest simplicity. On the morning of September 14
he begged for Extreme Unction, and soon after calmly
expired in the arms of the Archbishop of Durazzo.
" As he had lived/ writes Lochorst, " so he died peace
fully, calmly, devoutly, and holily." The words of the
Venetian historian Marino Sanuto might be taken as
his epitaph : " He was a good Pope, our friend, and a
lover of peace." No sooner was his death known in the
city than the Roman people came in crowds to venerate
the Father they had so much esteemed. The poor,
especially, all devout Christians, and the religious Orders,
deplored his death as a public calamity. But those who
had felt the lash of his reforms usurers and corrupters
of youth, men who had lost their offices in the Papal
Court, and with whom the " barbarian " Pope had ever
been unpopular rejoiced in his death as in a deliver
ance. After its temporary repose in the basilica of
St. Peter, the body of Adrian was eventually laid to rest
in the magnificent mausoleum in the Church of Santa
Maria dell Anima, erected by his friend and executor,
Cardinal Enkenvoert, who also is buried in the same
church.*

Adrian VI. s pontificate had lasted not quite twenty
months, of which little more than one year in Rome

* On the medals of Adrian VI. see Bonnani, " Numismata Pon-
tificum Romanorum" (Romse, 1699, t. i., pp. 181-184). He figures
and describes five medals, two being coronation medals, the reverse
representing Adrian being crowned by one and two Cardinals
respectively, with the motto Quern creant adorant. A third repre
sents the Holy Ghost descending upon the tiara and keys, beneath
which are a number of volumes of books motto Spiritus Sapi-
entice probably in compliment to Adrian s theological learning.
A fourth (of which a specimen is in the Hanmer Collection in the
Library of St. Bede s College) represents the two Princes of the
Apostles side by side, with the words Sanctus Petrus, Sanctus
Paulus. Lastly, the fifth depicts a tower in process of building,
with scaffolding round, and the motto Ut ipse finiam. Does this
refer to Adrian s desire to finish the building of St. Peter s, or to
his project of ecclesiastical reform ? Bonnani tells a curious story
of the attempt (" somniura ") of a Capuchin writer, Matt. Bellin-
tonus ( 1 586) to make out Adrian to be an Italian, born at Renzano,
in the diocese of Brescia, his father being one Giovanni Bono (!).

152 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

itself.* Short as it was, it was a well-filled reign, of
which it may justly be said not one hour was was ted. f
It stands forth as a bright page in the disordered and
often disedifying history of the sixteenth century, and
it was the first step towards that great internal reforma
tion of the Church, which was to see its culmination half
a century later under St. Pius V., for whom it was also
reserved to realize Adrian s scheme of turning back the
Moslem power and saving Europe from the Turkish
peril.

I do not think that Creighton s estimate of Adrian VI.
is generous, or even fair. We may all indeed agree with
him when he styles Adrian " a pathetic figure " (p. 271),
and in his true statement that the Dutch Pope had the
wisdom to see " that contemporary opinion was wrong,
in putting political questions in the front place instead
of reform " (p. 269). But he accentuates Adrian s
slowness and want of prompt decision. " He had not
the boldness of constructive genius. He went so far in
his boldness that it would have cost him little to be
bolder. As it was, he irritated and alarmed every
interest, while he gained no allies and awakened no
enthusiasm. ... No one paid much heed to him "
(p. 270). " His attitude was rather negative than posi
tive " (p. 234). There is a degree of truth in this judg
ment. Certainly as a politician and statesman, as before
remarked, Adrian stands at a disadvantage compared
with a contemporary like Ximenes. But Creighton
scarcely takes into sufficient account the extreme diffi
culty of his position, his isolation as a foreigner, the short
ness of his reign, his ill-health, and many other distressing

* Except Adrian I. (24 years), all the Popes of that name had
short pontificates : Adrian II., 4 years 10 months ; Adrian III.,
i year 4 months ; Adrian IV., 4 years 8 months ; Adrian V., only
i month 9 days.

f One of the greatest misfortunes which have pursued the
memory of Adrian VI. is the loss of his Regesta. They were all
carried off after his death by his Flemish secretary, Dietrich
Hetzius, to Lidge (not Louvain, as Creighton says), and he refused
to restore them to Clement VII. Where are they now ?

THE DUTCH POPE 153

circumstances of his life, which might have crippled the
best efforts of a much stronger man.

There is much in the career of Adrian VI. that recalls
that of his English namesake, Adrian IV. Both these
Teutonic Popes were humbly born ; both distinguished
themselves as brilliant scholars in spite of lack of means ;
both received unexpectedly rapid promotion to the
highest ecclesiastical honours ; both were unanimously
elected to the Papal See in the most unlooked-for manner ;
both were men of strenuous, simple, frugal, austere life ;
and both displayed in their high office the combination
of firmness and decision of purpose with personal humility.

But there is another obvious parallel. Like
Adrian VI., our present Holy Father, Pope Pius X., is
essentially a man of the people. Of lowly origin, by
sheer force of intellectual talent, of personal virtue, of
high character, he has been raised by Providence from
the humblest rank to the supreme dignity on earth ;
and although, thank God, in far better times and in
purer surroundings, the outcome of the conclave of 1903
was almost as great a surprise to the Christian world as
that of the conclave of 1522. Of both it may be said :
" Digitus Dei est hie." The simple frugal life and
homely tastes, the dislike of unnecessary court cere
monial, of the peasant s son of Riesi, recall those of the
weaver s son of Utrecht. And if Adrian VI. during his
brief pontificate showed himself a true reformer, what
have we not been led to expect in the way of reforms in
the short space that has already elapsed since the election
of Pius X. ?

Adrian VI. was surely a Pius X., born four centuries
before his time.

BOOKS TO BE CONSULTED.

CONSTANTIN HITTER VON HoFLER. " Papst Adrian VI." Wien :

Braumuller, 1880.
L ABBfi A. LEPITRE. " Adrien VI." Paris : Berche et Tralin,

1880.

E. H. J. REUSENS. " Syntagma Doctrine Theologicae Adrian!
Sexti, Pont. Max." Lovanii : Vanlinthout, 1862.

VI

THE ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFOR
MATION

THE decision of the Holy See of April 2, 1895,* removing
the ecclesiastical embargo hitherto laid upon the access
of our Catholic students to the national Universities,
marked the beginning of a new epoch in the history of
Catholic education, or, to put it perhaps more correctly,
indicated the closing of an era which had lasted for some
three centuries. It will be fittingly recorded as signal
izing the same year of grace w r hich had seen the publica
tion of the Apostolic Letter " Ad Anglos." We are
much too near both events to properly appreciate their
significance and probable results. We cannot be mis
taken in thinking that both will be one day estimated
as of unusual magnitude.

At any rate, the mind is irresistibly carried back,
across the desolate span of three hundred years of con
scription and persecution, to the times when the two
national Universities were not only accessible to Catholic
students, but were themselves Catholic institutions in
as true a sense as Louvain and Washington and Fribourg
are at the present day. To some minds this will not be
easy to realize. Every Catholic boy and girl knows how
we have been robbed of our grand old cathedrals, and a
visit to Canterbury, York, or Lincoln recalls memories
of a glorious past, associated with a keen sense of loss,
even to the least imaginative mind. But somehow or
* Tablet, April 27, 1895, p. 647.
IS4

UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFORMATION 155

other we seem almost to have forgotten that Oxford
and Cambridge are as truly lost heirlooms of our Church,
so identified have they become with the ideas of Pro
testantism, or even of free-thought and scepticism. Yet
the material and artistic loss of our beautiful cathedrals,
great as it was, has been far less than the intellectual
loss of the ancient seats of learning, the homes of culture,
and the national schools of theology. It seems appro
priate at this juncture to rehearse the sad history of the
process by which these national Universities were lost to
the Catholic Church, not without a long and gallant
struggle. To do this in a brief and commodious manner,
we purpose to select as our guide the short and excellent
monograph of Father Zimmermann, S.J., published
already some sixteen years ago, but which, like too many
admirable publications of its kind bearing upon English
Church history, has not yet found a translator in England
or America.* Father Zimmermann will prove a con
scientious and reliable guide. He has diligently utilized
the best sources of information up to the time of his
writing Abbot Gasquet s star had scarcely appeared
above the horizon and, as every page shows, has care
fully and critically digested both the older authorities,
like Wood, Cooper, Dugdale, or Spelman, and the modern
ones, like Mullinger, Brewer, Bridgett, or Seebohm.

* There is ample opening for the publication of a whole library
of valuable monographs, for instance, on English Churchmen,
translated from foreign languages. I will instance only a few :
Abbe Martin, " St. Etienne Harding et les premiers Recenseurs
de la Vulgate " (Amiens, 1887) " La Vulgate latine d apres
Roger Bacon" (Paris, 1888); and "Etienne Langton et le
Texte parisien de la Vulgate" (in the Museon, 1889-1890) ; Dr. J.
Felten, "Robert Grosseteste, Bischof von Lincoln" (Freiburg-
i.-B., 1887) ; Dr. K. Werner, " Beda der Ehrwiirdige und seine
Zeit " (Wien, 1875); " Alcuin und sein Jahrhundert " (Pader-
born, 1876) ; Alberdingk Thijm, " H. Willibrordus Apostel der
Nederlanden " (Amsterdam, 1861). Here are able and scholarly
studies, all comparatively short, of seven great English Church
men, all well deserving of translation and publication. It seems a
pity that they should not be better known and utilized in this
country.

156 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

This will serve as an excuse for presenting in this paper
little more than the summary of a book, itself not ex
ceeding 140 pages in extent.

I.

Mr. Gladstone s ingenious and curious contention in
his brilliant Romanes Lecture that the Universities
of the early Middle Ages were the outcome of " a great
systematic effort (of the) lay mind to achieve self-
assertion and emancipation"* as against the predomi
nance of ecclesiasticism, hardly commended itself at the
time to his hearers, f and probably will not do so to his
readers at the present moment. It is, indeed, highly
probable that the early universities, like Topsy, mostly
" growed." Zimmermann altogether discountenances
the old-fashioned idea that they were a continuation of
either the old cathedral or monastic schools, from which
they differed not only in the subjects and methods of
study, but still more in their entire organization.
Mr. Gladstone opines that the Papal authority may
have been used " as a defensive measure to keep in
check the separate action of the lay element." But,
although it may be true enough that the very earliest
Universities, such as Salerno or Bologna, as well as
Oxford and Cambridge ten altogether, according to
Mr. Gladstone were called into existence before either
Papal or regal authority began to intervene, yet there
does not seem to be much evidence for the supposed
organized system of " emancipation." The more prob
able solution appears to be that these schools, sprung
from what Mr. Gladstone more happily styles " profes
sional exigencies," were at first under local episcopal

* P. 10.

f " Unless the accepted view in these matters has been modified
by very recent researches, the accepted view is not quite that of
Mr. Gladstone," is the sensible criticism of a very scholarly
article in the Manchester Guardian of October 25, 1892, evidently
from an able though anonymous pen.

UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFORMATION 157

control. Green, indeed, by whom Mr. Gladstone seems
to some extent to have been influenced, points out that
at first the Chancellor of Oxford was simply the local
officer of the Bishop of Lincoln,* but that later on
" Popes, seeing in Jaern the possibility of an intellectual
tool and weapon jpjat the Church needed, gave them
privileges and injpinities/ t Be this as it may, the
early English Universities, although true " republics of
letters," were thoroughly Catholic institutions, and for
all practical purposes may be styled ecclesiastical ones.
The famous " secession " of the students in 1209 is the
first certain date in the history of Oxford, whose founda
tion almost certainly preceded that of Cambridge.
From the first the history of both Universities was
intimately bound up with all that was best and holiest
in the English Church. jThe Oxford career of St.
Edmund Rich, so beautimlly told by Green, J falls
between 1219 and 1226, and it was the Saint of Abingdon
who first taught Aristotle at Oxford. But it is more
especially with the coming of the friars of the Orders of

* " History of the English People," book iii., chapter i.
(Library edition, vol. i., p. 205).

f The most recent, as well as the most complete statement
of the origins of the European Universities before 1400 is that of
the great historian of these Universities, the late F. Denifle, O.P.
His conclusions may thus be summed up : Four categories may
be made according to the manner of foundation : ( i ) The eleven
which arose without any formal diploma of foundation, some
of these being the outcome of pre-existing ecclesiastical schools
among these are some of the most illustrious of all, including
Paris, Bologna, and Oxford ; (2) sixteen created exclusively by
Papal diploma, among which Denifle places Cambridge ; (3) ten
created exclusively by imperial and royal charters ; (4) nine,
created simultaneously by both Papal and royal decrees (" Die
Universitaten des Mittelalters bis 1400," von H. Denifle, vol. i.,
pp. xiv, 814). These significant statistics confirm the truth of
Paulsen s dictum : " In the erection of the Universities there
was formerly absolute liberty, not outside the Church, but inside
the Church, and the Church blessed without reserve and with
equal affection both the good she did herself and the good which
was done in her " (see P. Berthier, O.P., " Projets anciens des
hautesffitudes catholiques en Suisse ").

t Op. cit.

158 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

both St. Dominic and St. Francis that the early glories
of Oxford are so intimately bound up. It was immedi
ately after his second general Chapter in 1221 that
Brother Dominic despatched his first party of friars to
England, and it was at Oxford, on the Feast of the
Assumption, that they first settled and opened schools.
Very soon learned men flocked to their Order, including
Robert Bacon, uncle or brother to the still more famous
Roger, and his dearest friend, Richard Fishacre, " the
most learned among the learned," as Ireland calls him,
and who ever carried the works of Aristotle in his bosom ;
also Robert Kilwardby, eminent as philosopher and
theologian, a future Archbishop of Canterbury and
Cardinal ; and John of St. Giles, called by Matthew
Paris " a man skilful in the art of medicine, a great pro
fessor of divinity, and excellently learned." In 1229
took place another curious " secession " of students,
this time to Oxford, from the mother University of Paris,
as a protest against the violation of certain privileges.
Among these were the Dominicans of St. James s Con
vent, and with them their General, Blessed Jordan, who
wrote to the nuns at Bologna, " Our Lord gives me hopes
of making a good capture in the University of Oxford,
where I now am." The Dominicans, indeed, contributed
some of its brightest ornaments to the University.*
But, as Mr. Gladstone points out, the greatest names
belonging to Oxford in the thirteenth and fourteenth
centuries " are not of the Order of St. Dominic, to whom
Dante awards the intellectual brightness of the cherub
(Paradise, xi. 39-41), but in the ranks of the seraphic
Francis, who could not abide the world, even in its
academic form."f

The Franciscan Order (he says elsewhere) gave to
Oxford the larger number of those remarkable, and even

* See the late Mother Augusta Theodosia Drane s admirable
" History of St. Dominic," chap, xxxii., pp. 442-446, on the
Friars Preachers at Oxford.

f Op. cit., p. 1 8. The Franciscans came to Oxford in 1225.

UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFORMATION 159

epoch-making, men who secured for this University such
a career of glory in medieval times.* These men were
of English birth, but the fame of their school was such
that Franciscans nocked to it, not only from Scotland
and Ireland, but from France, Italy, Spain, Portugal,
and Germany.

The most famous of these luminaries whom Mr. Glad
stone cites in his generous eulogium on the Oxford
Friars Minor were Alexander of Hales, Adam Marsh,
Archbishop Peckham, Duns Scotus, William of Ockham,
and, greatest of all, " perhaps the most striking British
intellect of the Middle Ages," the earlier and the greater
of the two Bacons, Roger. f Mr. Gladstone goes on to
point out how the fame of the early Oxford Franciscans
were consecrated by " that superlative distinction " of
a special epithet attached to their names, " coin of Euro
pean rather than of British currency," such as " Doctor
irrefragabilis " (Alexander of Hales), " Doctor subtilis "
(Scotus), " Doctor mirabilis " (Bacon), and others. J
Thus it was that the very foundations of Oxford s great
ness, which won for her, already as early as 1252, the
epithet aemula Parisiensis, are owing to the two men
dicant Orders, not merely for their own scientific
achievements, but also because they stimulated by their
example the secular and regular clergy. Very soon the
Bishops and the Benedictines had founded colleges at
Oxford. Merton, the first Oxford college, dates from
1264 ; the first Cambridge foundation was Peterhouse,
1274.

* Op. cit., p. 12.

f Sir John Herschel, Mr. Lewis (quoted by Mr. Gladstone),
and, we may add, Professor Jevons ("Logic," p. 229), estimate
Roger above his famous namesake, Francis Bacon. The same
estimate of the great Franciscan is warmly maintained by Mr. J.
Vellin Marmery in his book entitled " Progress of Science : its
Origin, Course, Promoters, and Results " (London : Chapman
and Hall, 1895), in which he spiritedly defends the Middle Ages
from the old-fashioned charge of intellectual stagnation.

t Op. cit., p. 19.

Op. cit., p. 17.

i6o SKETCHES IN HISTORY

I have dwelt perhaps too long upon these early facts,
but my object is to emphasize the essentially Catholic
character of our national Universities from their incep
tion. The same is true from the point of view of their
character and discipline, so unlike what they have come
to be in these last three centuries. To begin with, the
ancient University offered access to the poor, even to the
very poor. The penniless student athirst for knowledge
was not an object of contempt, but was on a perfect level
with the richest and the noblest. His life was hard
enough, though he generally had sufficiency of food, and
there were many charitable foundations to assist, not
to pauperize, him. The discipline was severe.* The
course was much longer : seven years study was re
quired to reach the Master s degree ; theology took ten
years. | The student was not merely receptive ; on
attaining his degree, he was obliged himself to teach
" cursorie." Public disputations were frequent, as still
in Catholic Universities and seminaries abroad. This
system may have had its weak points, but it was well
suited to the times. It may be questioned whether we
are not slowly coming back to some part, at least, of the
old ways of the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth
centuries.

The opening of the fifteenth century was characterized,
as our own days, by a remarkable devotion to learning
on the part of the lower classes. A statute of 1406 laid
down the grand principle, which the nineteenth century
believed itself to have established, that it is free to any
man, of whatever social rank he may be, to have his son
or daughter educated in any school of the kingdom.
Numerous colleges were founded during the century :
Lincoln, 1427 ; All Souls and Magdalen, 1457 ; King s,
1440 ; Queen s, 1458 ; Catherine Hall, 1475 ; Jesus,
1497. Henry VI. and his Queen were special patrons of

* As late as 1540 undergraduates could receive the birch-rod
(Zimmermann, p. 65).

| So in old Lou vain (see " The Dutch Pope," p. 109).

UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFORMATION 161

the universities. Let it be remembered that colleges at
this time were really charitable foundations to aid poorer
students, and in each case established out of pious
motives, for God s glory and to obtain prayers and
masses for the souls of the founders. During this
century also began the close connection between the
universities and the great public schools, such as Win
chester and Eton, so that " young men at the English
universities were better prepared than elsewhere."*

The close of the century saw the rise of " Humanism,"
or the "New Learning,"! the cradle of which was in Italy.
Oxford men, like Robert Fleming, William Grey, John
Gun thorp, John Free, Tiptoft, Earl of Worcester, and
William Snelling, O.S.B., went to Italy to become
learners. J In 1488 three Italian humanists, one of
whom was Cornelio Vitelli, were at Oxford, boarding
at Magdalen College. Vitelli taught Greek to Grocyn,
perhaps also to Linacre. Both these great English
humanists were good and zealous Catholics. Grocyn
was an ascetic, devout man, much attached to the
scholastic philosophy. Linacre, distinguished for his
studies in medicine, and worthy of record as the founder
and first President of the Royal College of Physicians,
was no less celebrated for his piety, and late in life (1509)
became a priest. The illustrious pupils of Grocyn and
Linacre were Erasmus and Sir Thomas More. Other
eminent names among the Oxford humanists of the day
were William Latimer and William Lyly, and, above all,
John Colet. A Londoner (b. 1466), Colet visited Italy
for purposes of study, but his strongly ascetic mind
saw and realized more easily than many others the
intellectual and moral dangers of Humanism, of which,
however, he himself became one of the brightest orna-

* Zimmermann, p. 8. To the same writer we are also in
debted for an admirable monograph on " Our Public Schools "
(" England s Oeffentlichen Schulen," Freiburg, 1892).

f For another meaning of this term, see Gasquet s " Eve of
the Reformation."

\ Ibid.

II

162 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

ments. In 1496 he returned to Oxford, and soon gained
great fame and influence by his eloquence and learning,
not only in Greek, but also in the interpretation of Holy
Scripture. Two years later we find the famous Erasmus
of Rotterdam at Oxford, studying Greek under Grocyn
and Linacre. Together with his friend More, with their
two teachers, with Charnock and Colet, he formed the
never-to-be-forgotten coterie of classical scholars which
graced Oxford at the close of the fifteenth century. Up
to this, as Mr. Gladstone is justified in claiming, Oxford
had far and away surpassed her sister of Cambridge,
giving to England nearly all her great theologians,
bishops, and statesmen. Cambridge seems to have been
marked by a kind of apathy. Even in Greek learning,
scarce one or two names of note can be recorded.

During the following century, however, things altered,
and eventually at least, as regards humanitie^ the
positions were almost reversed. Cambridge owes her
awakening almost entirely to Blessed John Fisher. It
would be useless here to repeat the well-known story of
his life. Suffice it to say that, born in 1469, he entered
Cambridge in 1483. As confessor of the Lady Margaret,
Countess of Richmond, the pious mother of Henry VII.,
he was soon able to exercise great influence in favour of
his Alma Mater. To him is owing a novel institution,
the establishment of salaried professorships, independent
of the colleges. The Lady Margaret Chair of Divinity
was founded at this time. The university awoke to new
life and activity. In 1503 Pope Alexander VI. em
powered the Chancellor to send out yearly twelve priests,
either Doctors of Divinity or Masters of Arts, to preach
all over England, Ireland, and Scotland. The next year
Fisher himself became Chancellor. In 1506 Erasmus,
probably induced by the new Chancellor, came to
Cambridge. The great humanist does not appear to
have had the gifts of a successful teacher. His great
faults of character, too, his vanity, frivolity, love of
ridicule and invective, all of which render his testimony

UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFORMATION 163

about his contemporaries eminently suspect, might, but
for the goodwill of Fisher, have led to unpleasant strife
at Cambridge.* Fisher esteemed his real talents, and,
wishing to utilize them for the Church, avoided doing
anything to drive him into the hostile camp. Several
eminent men at the university Bullock, Gonell, Bryan,
Aldrich, Waston were among his pupils, and others
were encouraged by him to take up the study of Greek.
Fisher himself, in 1518, then in his fiftieth year, learnt
Greek. Thus, as the classical studies began to decline at
Oxford, they grew in favour at Cambridge.

Whilst Fisher was thus making himself the real father
of the greatness of Cambridge, three well-known Church
men were doing much for Oxford. The first of these was
Fox, Bishop of Winchester, than whom few prelates
have merited better of the universities. The college of
Corpus Christi, founded by him, shows in its statutes
the strong influences of the Renascence, f Great stress
was laid upon the reading of the classical authors.
Scarcely less important was the influence of Archbishop
Warham and of Cardinal Wolsey, of whom it will be
necessary to speak later, when on the subject of the
great religious separation. In several important points
Wolsey displayed really marvellous breadth of view.
He munificently endowed professorships, and one of the
men he brought to Oxford to fill a chair was the cele
brated Louis Vives. Still more remarkable was Wolsey s
grandiose scheme of establishing schools in all the chief
towns of the country, as preparatory schools for the
universities. His foundation of Cardinal College, which
he was never able to complete, and which scarcely sur
vived his fall, is too well known to repeat here. He has
been severely blamed by Protestant and Catholic writers
alike, from Spelman to Mullinger, for his action in
utilizing the revenues of the suppressed minor monas-

* For an excellent estimate of Erasmus, see Gasquet s " Eve
of the Reformation."
t See p. 192.

II 2

164 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

teries to endow his college. Zimmermann, however, is
inclined to defend him, and invokes Pope Clement VII.,
whose permission was granted for the purpose, as had
been done in other cases of a similar kind. Wolsey s
misfortune, he thinks, was to have had such a tool as
Thomas Crumwell to employ for the purpose.*

But Oxford had fallen upon evil times. To begin with,
visitations of sore disease wellnigh threatened her
existence. From 1509 to 1528 constant outbreaks of
epidemics, generally the dreaded " sweating sickness,"
drove away the students in crowds. More tells us in
1523 that the abbots had almost ceased to send their
monks to the university ; neither the nobleman would
send his sons, nor the parish priest his subjects or
kinsfolk. Many hostels were altogether closed. This
sad state of things was doubtless owing to the unhealthy
position of the city and its shocking sanitary arrange
ments, or rather utter want of sanitation. Vives com
plains bitterly of the unhealthiness of the place.

Intellectual dissensions also broke out with con
siderable bitterness. It is a reproach to be made
against the early humanists that, in the pride of their
New Learning, they too often showed themselves
narrow-minded, insolent, and overbearing, and affected
contemptuous scorn of the scholastic philosophy,
chiefly on account of their own ignorance of anything
outside the narrow circle of their own philological and
literary studies. | At first they seem to have been
received by the theologians and philosophers with
good humour and deference, but later on the opposition
of the theologians to the New Learning was stimulated
to regrettable exaggeration. So arose the feud between
the " Greeks " and the " Trojans," as the anti-humanists
came to call themselves. More had to invoke the

* Zimmermann, p. 24. But see Gasquet, " Henry VIII. and
the English Monasteries," vol. i., pp. 78 et seq.

f See Pastor, " Geschichte der Papste" (4th edition, 1901),
vol. i., pp. 15-41.

UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFORMATION 165

intervention of the King, and Greek was at last duly
recognised as a regular branch of study.

Such was the state of things at the national univer
sities at the dawn of the dark day of the religious
troubles under Henry VIII.

II.

Mr. Gladstone does but formulate the universal
verdict of history when he tells us that in the new
epoch which now opened Cambridge was to become the
cradle of English Protestantism,* to which we may add
that Oxford was long to remain the citadel of English
Catholicism. t This fact is not without its explanation.
Wycliffism, it must be remembered, was still existent
in the country as a religious faith, and its home was
chiefly in the eastern counties, which, moreover, owing
to their geographical situation, were in easy and constant
communication with the Netherlands and Germany.
It cannot surprise us, then, that in these districts the
writings of Luther and other Continental " reformers "
came to be circulated by the agency of booksellers,
bankrupt traders, and various kinds of smugglers.
They made their way soon enough to the University of
Cambridge. As early as 1517 Luther seems to have
found there an imitator in his denunciation of indul
gences. This was a Norman, Peter de Valence, who was
eventually publicly excommunicated by the Chancellor,
Bishop Fisher, and who, though not an Englishman,
may be claimed as the first English Protestant. The
first head of the Protestant party was, however, the
talented, but eccentric, and (like Luther) originally
scrupulous, " Little Bilney," who by a secret propa
ganda won over by degrees to the Lutheran doctrine a
knot of men Arthur, fellow of St. John s, Smith,
a doctor of canon law, Forman of Queen s, and one or

* " Romanes Lecture," pp. 23-25. f Zimmermann, p. 31.

166 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

two others. But his most celebrated conquest was that
of Robert Barnes, prior of the Augustinians. Both
Bilney and Barnes, it is worth noting, were Norfolk men.
Barnes had been a student of Louvain, and was an
enthusiastic humanist. His worldly and lax character
would seem to have little fitted him for a " reformer,"
but he really became the leader of the party. It is
remarked that, at least for the present, these English
Lutherans did not go so far as Luther himself in all.
points, refraining, for instance, from attacks on the
Catholic doctrine of the Holy Eucharist. Bilney s next
successful move, the winning over of Hugh Latimer,
was of a character very shocking to a Catholic mind.
He went to confession to Latimer, and under the pretext
of seeking advice in his mental and spiritual doubts,
difficulties and trials, succeeded in winning the confi
dence and esteem of Latimer, who seems to have been
up to this of a guileless and unsuspicious nature, and
hitherto had enjoyed the reputation of piety and str ct
orthodoxy. Very soon he was entirely under Bilney s
influence and guidance. Latimer s character does not
certainly seem to have gained by the new direction
under which he fell. Duplicity and a decided want of
steadfastness are stamped on his subsequent career.
Summoned before Bishop West of Ely to answer for
preaching Lutheran doctrine, he declared that he knew
nothing about Luther s teachings as it was forbidden
to read his books. In 1531 we find him, after some show
of manful resistance, on his knees at Lambeth admitting
having preached error, declaring that his hasty speech
had led him into errors and want of discretion, and
begging pardon for the scandal caused. Two years later
he was again accused of the same errors, and declared
he had been misunderstood. Arthur and Bilney too,
after some hesitation, are found recanting their errors,
and altogether these early English Protestants show a
decided want of constancy and much moral weakness
as compared with their predecessors, the Lollards.

UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFORMATION 167

It is difficult to explain Wolsey s want of firmness and
foresight at this juncture. When Barnes and Latimer
were cited before him, he not only, led astray by
Latimer s skilful pleading, reversed Bishop West s
prohibition to him to preach, but with his legatine
power gave him general faculty to preach everywhere.

From Cambridge the infection of the Lutheran
heresy was carried to Oxford in 1526 by a small band of
students, whose leader seems to have been one John
Clarke. The importation of the dangerous doctrines
into his own university alarmed Wolsey, and roused him
at last into some activity.

The curious history of the attempts to arrest Thomas
Garrett of Magdalen, the most zealous propagator of
the writings of the Continental reformers, as related by
his friend Dalaber, is a tragi-comic story of adventures.
Dalaber himself does not come very honourably out of
it, for we find him, when brought up before Dr. Loudon,
the head of New College, whom he styles " the worst
Papist Pharisee of all," himself playing a highly discredit
able part. After long opposition he finally promised, and
even swore on the Mass-book, to answer according to
the truth, " but in his heart resolved the opposite."
He ended by betraying his twenty-two companions,
and was then set at liberty. On the other hand, it
impresses us unpleasantly to find the University Com
missioner, Dr. Cottisford, having recourse to an
astrologer to find out the whereabouts of the fugitive
Garrett !* The latter being eventually incarcerated
wrote a suppliant letter, begging not so much for
delivery from the fetters he had merited as from the
terrible fetters of excommunication, f Several of the
other innovators were apprehended, but the authorities
displayed considerable mildness in their treatment of
them. Dr. Higdon (Dean of Cardinal College), who
himself caused their apprehension, writes to Wolsey

* Zimmermann, p. 41.

t "Letters and Papers" (Brewer), iv., 1804.

168 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

begging for absolution for them, and permission to
make their Easter duties. Longland, Bishop of Lincoln,
apparently expecting their amendment, also pleaded
for them. More than a dozen of these suspects took
part in the penitential procession from St. Mary s to
St. Frideswide s, and as they passed the Carfax cast
there a book into the fire. Foxe s harrowing tales in
his " Book of Martyrs " about noisome underground
dungeons and salt food are manifestly apocryphal.*
Three of them died in August of the sweating sickness,
and seem to have shown some repentance. Altogether,
as before remarked, these early Protestants did not
display much of the stuff of which martyrs are made.

More than this, men of the eloquence of Luther or
the wide learning of Melanchthon were wanting in their
ranks. Some of them were coarse and vulgar in their
expression, and not likely to exercise much influence
among the more cultured. Indeed, the whole movement
would probably have died out without leaving any
appreciable traces, as it did in Italy and Spain, but for
the lamentable affair of the Royal Divorce that true
fons et origo malorum of the English Church. The
effects of the divorce case may be thus summed up in a
sentence the numerically and intellectually weaker
party got the upper hand, and the universities were
reduced to a state of servitude.

It was in 1530, two years after the events just narrated,
that Henry VIII., being determined upon his divorce
from Queen Catherine, appealed to the two universities
for a favourable decision. From what has gone before,
we can hardly wonder that he appealed first to Cam
bridge. Cranmer, Fox, and Gardiner, his chief tools
in the matter, were Cambridge men. It is remarkable
that the older men were inclined to yield to the very
urgent arguments of the King ; the younger held out
more manfully. Now every kind of pressure was
brought to bear. The King s party, not daring to

* Zimmermann, p. 42.

UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFORMATION 169

challenge a vote of the university at large, brought
about the appointment of a Special Commission. But
even in this Commission, partial as it was, things did not
go smoothly, and the final decision that was extorted
ran thus : " Ducere uxorem fratris mortui sine liberis
cognitam a priori viro per carnalem copulam, est pro-
hibitum iure divino ac naturali." Practically the
verdict was dead against the King, for it was exactly
the consummation of the marriage with Prince Arthur
that was steadfastly denied by the Queen. We know,
therefore, what value to attach to Froude s eulogy of
the spirit of independence and liberality of Cambridge
in favouring the divorce* as compared with the narrow-
mindedness of Oxford. As a matter of fact, both the
national seats of learning rejected it.f

Oxford, however, was certainly much more strongly
Catholic, and so remained for several generations.
And whilst the Protestant party was very unpopular
there, the party of the Queen was especially popular.
Mr. Gladstone is correct in maintaining that there was
a difference in the prevalent theological cast of the
two universities. "Oxford was on the losing side. . . .
It might be said, without any great perversion of
historical truth, that in the sixteenth century the
deepest and most vital religious influences within the
two universities respectively were addressed at Oxford
to the making of recusants, at Cambridge to the pro
duction of Zwinglians and Calvinists."J

No wonder that extraordinary efforts were made by
Henry to coerce the Oxford intellect and will. The
younger generations here again, especially the Arts men,
held out gallantly, and drew down the royal wrath,
expressed in no measured language in Henry s letters.
He concludes by reminding them, in words which recall
our Latin exercise books, " Non est bonum irritare

* " History of England," i., 257-262.

I Zimmermann, p. 44.

J " Romanes Lecture," p. 25.

170 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

crabrones."* Unfortunately, it must be admitted that
the part played by Archbishop Warham in this matter
was a discreditable one. He did not hesitate to assert
that the Universities of Cambridge and Paris had
already pronounced in favour of the divorce, which was
a falsehood. Cambridge s decision we have seen above ;
that of Paris had not been given at this time. After
this we can scarcely be surprised at Henry s false citation
in his letter of March 17, of the Cambridge decision, by
simply omitting the crucial clause italicised in our
quotation above.

In spite of all, of King and Primate, and even of the
threatened weakness of the theological faculty under
tremendous pressure, it is refreshing to find the M.A. s
holding out gallantly. After eight weeks strenuous
contest and every kind of intrigue, nothing further could
be squeezed out of the university than a decision
practically equivalent to that of Cambridge for which,
of course, Oxford falls in for the censures of Mr. Froude.f

Henry s wrath descended heavily on the university,
whose great Chancellor, Cardinal Wolsey, had already
fallen into disgrace in the preceding October. It was
his famous college, Cardinal College, that was to feel
the full fury of the storm. And after various efforts to
ward off the blow, spoliation and suppression rapidly
followed one another perhaps among the bitterest of
the dregs that the fallen Chancellor had to drink.

Five years later the great Chancellor and benefactor
of the sister university, Blessed John Fisher, died the
martyr s death upon the scaffold (June 22, 1535).
Unlike Wolsey and Warham, the saintly Bishop had
early -on foreseen the dangers for the English Church
which the spread of the Lutheran heresy only too
surely threatened, but his warnings had been unheeded
by these mighty prelates. His own services to Cam
bridge slackened not until the end. His new statutes,

* Letter of March 6, Zimmermann, p. 46.
f " History of England," i., p. 279.

UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFORMATION 171

to some extent borrowed from Oxford, were directed
partly to elevating the level of the studies, partly to
remedying the evergrowing indiscipline and recklessness
of the rising generation. He is therefore very far from
meriting the charge of narrow-mindedness which even
Mullinger makes against him,* and not only St. John s
College, as that historian truly claims, but the whole
university may justly look back with gratitude and
pride to Bishop Fisher as the greatest of her benefactors.
The remaining years of Henry, from 1535 to 1547,
are rightly summed up by Father Zimmermann in refer
ence to our subject as the epoch of the plundering and
enslaving of the universities. The meanness and greed
which disgraced the policy of the latter years of the
reign do not always, or even generally, mark the policy
of the " Turkish Sultans" to whom Zimmermann com
pares him. Henry has been praised as a patron of the
universities, and a declaration of his is often quoted
to the effect that no foundations are more to the general
good than those in favour of colleges, and sharply
discriminating between the universities and the monas
teries. There is good reason to suspect the sincerity
of these expressions, and to believe that a systematic
spoliation of the universities was originally intended to
follow in due course that of the monasteries. In spite
of his foundation of Trinity, Cambridge, from purely
political motives, Henry cannot be said to have esteemed
either learning or learned men for their own sake.f
But what is a much more serious charge is that his
policy was directed to a systematic enthraldom of the
intellect. Never were independent thought and free
dom of research so much kept in fetters as at this
epoch. The King s changeableness of disposition and
views rendered this mental servitude the more galling.
The universities were called upon to change the opinions
they had to defend according to the royal humour.

* " History of England," i., p. 624,
f Zimmermann, pp. 53, 54, 67.

172 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Thomas Crumwell was made Visitor of both the uni
versities, and an elaborate document containing detailed
instructions was drawn up, which Zimmermann analyses.
The first article expressly stipulates that the members
of the university are to promise obedience not only to
the rules of succession established by the King, but also
to all statutes directed to the uprooting of the Papal
claims and the confirmation of the King s supreme
authority. No lectures were to be permitted upon the
Master of Sentences and his commentators ; only the
Old and New Testament in their literal sense were to be
expounded. This was, of course, directed to the
abolition of the scholastic philosophy and theology.
Both lectures and degrees in canon law were to be
abolished, " as all England (!) had acknowledged the
ecclesiastical supremacy of the King." Melanchthon s
name is inserted among the authors to be expounded in
philosophy. All heads of houses and professors must
swear obedience to these new statutes. Two pliant
tools, Dr. Layton and Dr. Legh, were deputed in place
of their master, Crumwell, as Visitors to Oxford and
Cambridge respectively. Then followed a veritable
panic, a reign of terror. With what high-handed
violence the new ordinances were carried out we can
learn from Layton s letters to his master. Duns Scotus
was the object of special ill-treatment. His books were
torn up and scattered about with every circumstance
of ignominy. This was practically the banishment of
sound logic from the English universities, remarks
Zimmermann caustically, and so things have remained
till quite recent times. Legh proceeded with somewhat
more moderation in Cambridge.

No wonder that these measures, and the general
uncertainty which prevailed, rapidly tended to
diminish the number of students. But the severest
blow which the universities received was in the suppres
sion of the great monasteries between 1536 and^T.539-
Dr. Loudon was commissioned to suppress the nine

UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFORMATION 173

colleges of the regular orders Benedictines, Cistercians,
Augustinians, Franciscans, and Dominicans in Oxford.
Nobles, townsfolk, and heads of secular colleges threw
themselves greedily upon the plunder ; the subjects
were bettering the unworthy example of their sovereign.
The few regular colleges at Cambridge had no better
fate. But the effects of the suppression of the monas
teries were more far-reaching. Among these was he
destruction of so many of the middle schools which had
served as feeders for the universities by affording
training for talented boys of the poorer classes. Now
began that gradual change which eventually led to the
practical shutting out of the poorer classes who before
this epoch had been in the majority at the universities
and the exclusive reservation of these national insti
tutions to the rich and the noble. A little later than
this, as Mr. Gladstone reminds us, " Ascham says that
among the prevailing evils there was none more grave
than the large admission of the sons of rich men indiffer
ent to solid and far-reaching study."* But this was
the process which now began and went steadily on for
three centuries.

On Crumweirs fall in 1540 Bishop Gardiner succeeded
as Chancellor. It is not our business here to discuss
the somewhat ambiguous character of Stephen Gardiner.
As bishop he appears to have shown a less pliant dis
position than Henry had expected from his former
behaviour. He was at any rate a scholar of some merit.
During his chancellorship occurred his famous quarrel
with the gifted Hellenist, John Cheke, concerning the
pronunciation of Greek, which led to a strife as bitter
as (to us) it is amusing. Here we meet with the first
beginnings of the " pedantry," which for some time was
to cling to English learning. The chancellorship of
Gardiner, however, to some extent appears as a time of
comparative prosperity to the university. The new
regulations published in 1544 were wise and useful.
* " Romanes Lecture," p. 23.

174 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

The foundation of Magdalen College, although the
complete carrying out of the original plan was not
possible till Mary s reign (1584) falls in this time, and,
at length, also Henry s own long promised foundation
Trinity, Cambridge. In spite of all the misery and
uncertainty of the times there was still a certain number
of scholars of note at the universities, but of these the
majority were true to the Old Faith.

At the death of Henry VIII. the country was in a state
of the greatest anarchy that it had seen since the
Conquest. Never had there been such a severing of
classes and such divisions of men s minds. The people
were in a temper of despair, and, but for the paid army
at the King s command, a revolution would probably
have broken out. The short reign of the boy-king
Edward VI. was to mark the victory of Protestantism
a victory which, in spite of the temporary Catholic
reaction under Mary, was to be continued and consoli
dated under Elizabeth. The Protector Somerset was a
convinced Calvinist ; Warwick, later Duke of Northum
berland, though at heart a Catholic, relied for the success
of his schemes on the Protestant party, as the Catholics
naturally favoured Mary.

From the intellectual point of view, the Protestants
at this time were decidedly weak, especially in theo
logians. Cranmer and his friends could not help feeling
that they had no men at the universities who could be
considered a match for scholars like Dr. Richard Smith,
Mallet, or Chedsey at Oxford, Young and Bullock at
Cambridge. As Mr. Gladstone points out, " A proof of
this relative weakness is supplied by the single fact that
to reform our service-books, and to instruct our candi
dates for holy orders, we were driven to invoke the aid
of foreigners."* Already in Henry s lifetime unsuc
cessful overtures had been made to Melanchthon, and now
Bucer and Fagius were imported to Cambridge, and
Peter Martyr (whose name was Vermigli) to Oxford.
* " Romanes Lecture," p. 25.

UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFORMATION 175

In 1548 and 1549 a new Commission of Visitation was
issued for both universities. The statutes, under the
sanction of all kinds of penalites, fines, imprisonment,
etc., were to effect a thorough revolution in the Protes
tant sense. The old doctrine was to be extirpated,
foundations for masses to be commuted, the forms of
Divine service to be altered. Some changes were intro
duced into the prescribed courses of study, and efforts
made, not, indeed, with success, to encourage the study
of civil law. Further confusion was a necessary result.

Peter Martyr began his lectures at Oxford in 1549.
He was the first in England to deny the Real Presence.
His crude Zwinglian teaching regarding the Holy
Eucharist disgusted the Catholics. Quarrels, and even
physical strife, were the result. Shocking scenes of pro
fanity and desecration occurred in some of the college
chapels, especially Magdalen. At Cambridge Dr. Cox
was the bitterest enemy of the Catholics. He displayed
a literal fury in the wholesale destruction of books and
MSS. A new feature in the strife was the introduction
of public disputations between the parties. Dr. Richard
Smith challenged Peter Martyr to such a trial of skill,
but his crafty adversary eluded every attempt to make
him face so able a disputant with quite an amusing
variety of subterfuges. The end was that Smith, like
so many other of Oxford s ablest men, was forced to seek
refuge in flight to the Continent. Other Catholics,
however Tresham and Chedsey took up the cudgels
in his place, and Peter Martyr, forced at last to a disputa
tion, cut such a sorry figure that Dr. Cox, after four days,
adjourned the meeting sine die. Bucer, also at Cam
bridge, had to face the challenge of Young, Sedgwick,
and Andrew, and came off with little credit in a public
disputation on theology. Other such intellectual con
tests followed.

Somerset and Northumberland were meanwhile gradu
ally getting rid of the Catholic professors and officials,
whilst Catholic parents (who were still in the majority)

176 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

were withdrawing their sons from the national univer
sities to have them educated privately at home or at
foreign seats of learning. The lecture-rooms were
steadily emptying, and the diminishing ranks of students
were recruited only from the sons of the richer classes,
whose chief aim was pleasure, not study. We have
Latimer s and Lever s lamentations to bear out these
statements.* Hubert * s therefore fully justified in
maintaining that the " Reformation " had injured the
universities, both externally and internally. But we
cannot agree with him in comparing the reign of
Henry VIII. with that of Edward VI., to the advantage
of the former. Although the evils grew under the latter
reign, it was precisely Henry s policy which was respon
sible for them in their origin. Yet even Edward does
not seem to have merited all the praise which has been
bestowed on him as a patron of learning. The funds for
the schools of which he is reckoned the founder were for
the most part derived either from Church property or
the contributions of the local burgesses.

In the statutes of Trinity College, Cambridge, pub
lished by the visitors at this time, we find first fully
developed the systematic plan of making the colleges
independent of the university, an innovation which had
serious consequences later on, as we shall see. The
President is also to take an oath to maintain the Protes
tant doctrine, and the fellows are to be obliged to abjure
the Old Faith, whilst the scholars are to take an oath
recognising the Bible as the sole rule of Faith. We are
already in the full swing of those penal regulations which
long kept the doors of the universities locked against
Catholics from the inside.

From 1553 to 1558 the reign of Mary was marked by
the short-lived Catholic reaction. The circumstances of
her early life, the fanaticism of her religious opponents,
the personal affronts she had to endure under Edward s

* Letters quoted by Zimmermann," pp. 80, 81
f " English Universities," vol. i., p. 284.

UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFORMATION 177

reign, and the violence of the innovators even after her
accession, must go a long way to account for the bitter
ness and intolerance she herself displayed when in power.
At least, the universities flourished under her reign. She
stands out favourably from the other Tudors in her
patronage of learning, and in her personal munificence
to the universities. Two zealous Catholics, Sir Thomas
Pope and Sir Thomas White, founded at this time the
two Oxford colleges of Trinity and St. John s respec
tively ; whilst the Queen s physician, the celebrated
Dr. Caius, also an earnest Catholic, by remodelling
Gonville Hall, Cambridge, merited the title of the founder
of Gonville and Caius, now generally known by his own
name alone. The statutes display broad-minded zeal
for the promotion of the study of medicine, for which
foundations are provided to be enjoyed at Padua,
Bologna, Montpellier, or Paris. The careful disciplinary
regulations show us how far the moral tone had de
scended already at the universities. The keeping of
horses and dogs, as well as bull-baiting and bear-baiting,
have to be prohibited to the students. In spite of
Mullinger s contrary opinion, based upon such partial
witnesses as Ascham, Jewell, and Peter Martyr, Oxford
under Mary compares very favourably with Cambridge.
The number of students increased a good sign of pros
perity. The B.A. s who graduated during the reign at
Oxford were 216, as against 176 at Cambridge.

At the latter university Gardiner was reinstated as
Chancellor, and we cannot but regret that his reversal of
all that had taken place under Edward was carried out
with much of the same spirit in which it had been intro
duced. Some of the Protestant party, like Perne, Cheke,
and Cecil, yielded and became Catholics. Others were
driven out. Those were not days of toleration on either
side !* At the same time, we may remark that 125 M.A. s

* "It was not only Mary who thought that heretics should
be burnt. John Rogers, who was the first to suffer, had, in the
days of Edward, pleaded for the death of Joan Bocher " (S. R.
Gardiner, " Student s History of England," vol. ii., p. 424).

12

178 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

and 195 B.A. s graduated during five years of Mary, as
against 90 and 167 respectively during five years of her
predecessor. Gardiner died in 1555, and Cardinal Pole
succeeded him as Chancellor. Visitors were now sent to
both universities for the " extirpation of heresy," but
their new statutes were never carried out, for the Queen s
death followed immediately. Whatever views may be
held of her policy, it must at least be said that she did
more for the universities than either her predecessor or
her successor.

Over the reign of Elizabeth we must pass more rapidly.
It was the period, not only of the final triumph of Protes
tantism, but of the remodelling of Protestantism into
the form of Anglicanism, and the consequent beginning
of the long struggle between that form and Puritanism.
Elizabeth herself cannot be said to have had strong
religious convictions, and, like Cecil, who could easily
change his religion, was influenced rather by political,
or we may say national, motives.* Her endeavour all
along was to found a kind of middle party, a species of
Protestantism amalgamated with Catholic discipline.
This was " Anglicanism." As usual, a visitation of the
universities was carried out, with the inevitable new
regulations and the usual serious interference with the
rights and liberties of the ancient " republics of letters,"
which would never have been tolerated in the Middle
Ages. The Catholics showed great steadfastness, and
nearly all the heads of colleges and many of the fellows
at Oxford either resigned or suffered expulsion. The
new men put into their places were mostly very inferior.
The test oath, and the system of espionage and persecu
tion which followed it, found some, indeed, not quite so
stanch, and these few formed the kernel of the new
" Anglican party. " But the new doctrines had seriously

* " She cared nothing for theology, though her inclinations
drew her to a more elaborate ritual than that which the Pro
testants had to offer. She was, however, intensely national.
. . . For this end she must establish national unity in the
Church " (S. R. Gardiner, op. cit., p. 428).

UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFORMATION 179

lowered the general estimation of the ecclesiastical
character, and both the clergy and the universities sank
under Elizabeth into a pitiful condition. " Sunt mutse
musae nostraque fama fames " was the all too true com
plaint of the state of things at Oxford. As to the ignor
ance of the clergy, we have the emphatic testimony of
Pilkington, Bishop of Durham, and of Cecil.* The
former in 1561 reported that the heads of colleges were
so bad that he could not say whether their absence or
their presence were more harmful, for that none of them
did any good ; whilst " his heart bled " when he thought
of St. John s College. Next year Cecil wished to resign
the Chancellorship, out of disgust at the state of things ;
for the heads had no care to second him in either
controlling disorderly youth, enforcing discipline, or
encouraging science and godliness. Probably with the
design of improving the state of things at the univer
sities, Elizabeth paid her famous State visits to Cam
bridge in 1564 and to Oxford in 1566. As a matter of
fact, these sumptuous pageants did vastly more harm
than good. They tended to encourage the taste for
luxury and frivolous amusement, and especially to
develop a love for dramatic entertainments, which,
whilst directly beneficial to the rise of the English drama,
was certainly ill-calculated to improve study or academic
discipline.

In 1572 the celebrated Dr. Caius, who for a time had
been inclined, with some others, to favour the new via
media of Anglicanism, and had so kept his place, became
a victim of persecution. His college was broken into
(by the Vice- Chancellor and Dr. Whitgift, the future
Archbishop), and all his vestments, sacred vessels,
statues, and other objects cast into the flames. He did
not long survive the blow, dying in London, after a life
spent in doing more for the promotion of study at his
university than any of his contemporaries.

In spite of all, there was still considerable vitality in
* Zimmermann, pp. 96, 97.

12 2

i8o SKETCHES IN HISTORY

the Catholic party at least, at Oxford. Merton and
Corpus had already shown considerable pluck in defend
ing their privileges against Leicester in 1564. There was
even a certain Catholic reaction set in.

It would be interesting (says Zimmermann) to show
in detail how many professors and students at both
universities, little by little returned to the bosom of the
Catholic Church ; how, in very many instances, the
reading of Catholic writings converted zealous Protes
tants and timid Catholics ; with what zeal Catholic
booksellers or private persons strove to disseminate
Catholic tracts of devotion or controversy among the
students ; how often Protestant bishops or heads of
houses caused domiciliary visitations to be made,
destroyed Catholic books, or severely punished Catholic
booksellers or colporteurs.*

One of the best known of these latter cases was that of
Rowland Jenks. In 1592 the heads of houses at Cam
bridge established a commission to prosecute Catholics
for " seducing the young," complaining that no books
were so widely circulated as Catholic ones, and that in
many of the rooms of Anglican professors the majority
of the books found were those of scholastic theologians,
writings of Franciscans, Dominicans, and Jesuits.
Indeed, Anglicanism was no more able to produce a
scientific school of theology then than it has been
since. And there can be little doubt that, if the contest
had been fought out with intellectual weapons only, the
Catholic party would have come off easily victorious.
Mr. Gladstone admits that " the very ablest men among
those [Oxford] reared, such as Allen, Campion, Stapleton,
and the rest, were ejected and suppressed."!

It is hardly cognate to our purpose to follow Fr.
Zimmermann in his history of the struggle between
Anglicanism and Puritanism. " Nonconformity,"
indeed, took its rise at Cambridge, as Mr. Gladstone
points out.J Browne and Cartwright, the leaders of the

* Pp. 100, 101. I "Romanes Lectures," p. 25. Ibid.

UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFORMATION 181

movement, were Cambridge men of note. The latter s
election as Professor in 1569 and subsequent exclusion by
the Vice-Chancellor Mey led to a serious storm ; the
situation became so critical that a fresh revision of the
statutes was decided upon. It was John Whitgift who
was charged with this revision. This remarkable man
seems originally to have been a Calvinist, but his skilful
trimming made him a valued ally of the Queen. It is
well known to what importance he eventually rose as
Archbishop of Canterbury. Indeed, Fr. Zimmermann
does not hesitate to declare that to him and Elizabeth
is owing the foundation of the Anglican High Church
system, and that Laud (to whom, by the way, Mr. Glad
stone assigns so high a position as a Churchman*) merely
followed in their footsteps. Whitgift s new statutes
transferred the centre of gravity of university authority.
The heads of colleges formed a new body of very great
power, into whose hands almost all practical control was
transferred. This also had much effect upon subsequent
developments. Little by little the universities were
becoming mere seminaries for Anglican divines. Yet,
although Cartwright had to fly to Geneva, the Anglican
bishops were in an awkward position, and did not dare
to proceed to extremities against the Puritans, as against
the Catholics. There is a curious memorial of complaint
from them about the state of things at the universities,
chiefly interesting to us, as it incidentally refers to civil
law and natural science as " useless branches of study " !
The fact is, the universities were once more in a state of
intellectual decline, of which we have contemporary
testimony in Traver s " Ecclesiasticse Discipline Expli-
catio " (1574). Most of the best men fled abroad. So
in 1583 some eighty professors and students followed
Dr. Allen to Rheims, and most of these were from Oxford.
Leicester s influence at Oxford as Chancellor was for evil.
Though the number of students increased under his rule,
good discipline and study rapidly declined, and Oxford

* " Romanes Lecture," pp. 37-39.

182 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

was soon outstripped by Cambridge. The centre of
intellectual life had meanwhile been transferred to
London.

To sum up the results of the Reformation in the
universities. The independence and rights of the
national seats of learning had come to an end with
freedom of research and opinion. The authority of the
Senate had been superseded by that of the heads of
houses, as we have seen, and these colleges were merely
seminaries for training Anglican clergymen. The
students were made up of two classes the sons of the
nobility, idlers, and pleasure-seekers, on the one hand ;
and Protestant divines, on the other, to whom theology
was merely a " bread-study " leading to prospective
benefices. The best class the poorer middle class
had disappeared. The real talent of the universities
was to be sought abroad in the flourishing colleges
founded by Allen, or after his example, especially at
Douay, which at the time far surpassed Oxford. The
study of law and medicine had almost disappeared, and
the professors could get no hearers. In seven years
Oxford could produce but one doctor and eight bachelors
in law. The natural sciences and mathematics were
treated with the utmost contempt, as dishonourable for
university students !* Greek was almost forgotten.
During the last forty years of the century Mullinger
admits that only two men at Cambridge certainly knew
Greek, and perhaps three others had a smattering of it.
Things were worse at Oxford. Latin, too, was far less
known at the close than at the beginning of the century.
Hebrew, owing to the importance now attached to the
text of Scripture, had received some more attention ;
but the most distinguished Orientalist at Oxford,
Robert Wakefield,t na d been a Catholic ; and his brother

* See the quotations and examples, Zimmermann, p. 122.

f He became the first Professor of Hebrew at Louvain. He
had, however, supported the Royal divorce and shared in the
plundering of the monasteries (Neve). See pp. 194, 195.

UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFORMATION 183

Thomas, who also remained true to the faith, was the
first public professor of Hebrew at Cambridge, where,
however, Protestant bigotry forbade his lecturing.
Foreigners or Jews were the chief teachers of Hebrew
after them. Rhetoric had taken the place of solid
learning. History has only the name of Camden
(Oxford) to show ; Leland, the antiquarian, had been
suffered to die in neglect and poverty. In a word,
learning had not gained in a single branch by the
Reformation. And no attempt at improvement was
made till the reigns of the Stuarts.

College life and discipline had fared no better. An
entire change had come over society. The rural popula
tion, flocking to the towns, had become spoilt and cor
rupted.* The character of the bishops, clergy, and heads
of colleges had descended both intellectually and
morally. The abuses of the collegiate system of univer
sity " graces " and of the tutoral system had most
serious results upon the universities. The students
came up much too young lads of twelve or thirteen,
Peacham tells us and were badly prepared. The heads
of colleges abused their autocratic powers. The material
prosperity of the colleges (greatly augmented by Sir
Thomas Smith s wise regulations) was accompanied by
general intellectual stagnation. Poorer students, sizars,
were systematically degraded into the position of
drudges. How different from the state of things in the
Middle Ages !

" What the Reformation meant for the entire nation
was also what it meant for the universities the robbery
of the poor, the enrichment of the great, the almost
absolute exclusion of talent and industry from place and
honour. A brilliant university career had formerly
opened a path to high office in Church and State ; this
was now reserved for a privileged class. Formerly the
university professor was able, by one or more livings,
which laid upon him no obligation of residence, to secure

* Hall, " Society in the Elizabethan Age " (1887), pp. 104, 105.

184 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

an existence free from anxiety ; now the stipend of a
professor was far too little. Formerly, by the study of
philosophy, by public disputations and other scholastic
exercises, not only the memory, but also the thinking
powers, had been developed ; now study was directed
almost exclusively to cramming the memory. Formerly
there was freedom of research, so far as it did not run
counter to the dogmas of the Catholic Church ; now the
narrowest compulsory teaching prevailed. Formerly
ideal ends were united with science ; now science was
esteemed only so far as it served practical ends. From
the continental universities nothing had been borrowed
but unrestrained polemics and party passion. The
warning of Bacon* and others fell on deaf ears. Not
till the beginning of the present century were some of the
crying abuses which had crept in during the sixteenth
century done away with, and the universities brought
nearer to their true end and object." f

It is not without significance that the vast reforms in
the national universities which signalized the latter half
of the nineteenth century have all been in the direction
of the state of things in pre-Reformation times. There
has been a casting down of barriers first religious, by
the abolition of test-oaths ; then social, by the gradual
readmission of the middle and poorer classes. The
tendency nowadays to build a procession of bridges from
the primary school, across the middle school and
grammar school, up to the university itself, is merely a
reversion to what existed on a much larger scale in
Catholic times. Even for the poor boy, gifted by talent
and industry, there is now ever-increasing opportunity
for rising to an academic career, but as yet to a far less
extent than there was in the Middle Ages. The intellec
tual revival in every department has been extraordinary
indeed ; here, again, we are going back to the Oxford
and Cambridge of old England. During the last thirty

* Works, ad. Spedding, vol. iii., pp. 326-328, 597.
f Zimmermann, p. 138.

UNIVERSITIES AND THE REFORMATION 185

years, we are assured by unquestionable authority, the
growth of earnestness and the spirit of work, the decline
of luxury and frivolity, the greater simplicity of student
life, have made the Oxford and Cambridge of to-day
something very unlike that of even the seventies. Here,
again, we have a reversion to the thirteenth and two
subsequent centuries. This being so, it appears provi
dentially timed that a beginning should be made of once
more opening the road towards those old Catholic
foundations, the national universities, for the spiritual
and intellectual heirs of their founders, who have been
exiled from them for three hundred years. But the
restoration will scarce be complete till we can see the
successes of St. Edmund Rich, of Stapleton, and of Allen
and, may we hope, those of Kilwardby, Roger Bacon,
and Duns Scotus pursuing the same paths of study,
Divine as well as human, by the banks of the Isis and
the Cam.

BOOKS TO BE CONSULTED.

ATHANASIUS ZIMMERMANN, S.J. " Die Universitaten Englands
im 16 Jahrhundert." Freiburg im Breisgau : Herder, 1889.

RIGHT HON. W. E. GLADSTONE, M.P. " The Romanes Lecture,
1892: an Academic Sketch." Oxford: Clarendon Press,
1892.

VII

TWO ENGLISH SCHOLARS AND THE BEGIN
NINGS OF ORIENTAL STUDIES IN LOUVAIN

IT ought not to be necessary to plead before an audience
of Catholic theologians the great importance of Oriental
studies in the cause of theology and apologetic. The
value of Semitic languages for Scriptural exegesis has
been an admitted fact in all ages from St. Jerome
downwards. But exegesis is only one of the many
points vital points all of them where Oriental science
touches the domain of theology. In the century of
Strauss, Renan, and Kuenen, and sed longo intervallo
of popular writers like Mrs. Humphrey Ward and the
late Professor Huxley, the very fundamental bases of
" the Impregnable Rock of Holy Scripture," to borrow
Mr. Gladstone s phrase, suffer attacks from the side of a
newer kind of Orientalism, and require us to call in
for our defence not merely the " higher criticism " of
the more familiar Semitic tongues, but also the results
of those eminently nineteenth century developments,
Assyriology and Egyptology. Nor is this by any means
all. The century of Max Miiller, Tiele, de Gubernatis,
and Sir Edwin Arnold has developed yet new and
perhaps more insidious methods of attack not on
Christianity only, but on all the history of revelation,
from the side of the new sciences of " Comparative
Mythology " and the " History of Religions." In the
teaching of those sciences both the religion of the Old
Testament and the Christianity of the New are supposed

1 86

ORIENTAL STUDIES IN LOUVAIN 187

to find their place as merely some out of the many
phases of a mental and spiritual evolution, which begins
in a primitive animism and fetish worship, to end in
the Sermon on the Mount and the Epistles of St. Paul,
and in which Yahve and Christ hold a place with exactly
the same rights as Obatala, Thoth, Varuna, or Herakles.
It would, perhaps, be difficult to indicate any other field
of research on which it is more urgent for Catholic
scholars to employ their talents and energy than that
of the " Comparative History of Religions," with its
concomitant branches, such as Mythology and Folklore.
But all this means a wide and thorough study of various
departments of Orientalism. And what we want is an
army of specialists in each of these branches.

These general remarks may serve to introduce and
explain the appearance of the following historical
sketch of the earliest Oriental teachers and schools of
Louvain. Among Catholic centres of learning the
Belgian University has always held an honourable place
for its cultivation of such branches of Orientalism as
have been of importance at different epochs. In the
fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the Alma Mater was
publishing Hebrew Grammars and Commentaries on
Ecclesiastes ; in the nineteenth she is translating the
" Avesta," commenting the " Vedas," and solving for
the first time in literary history the riddles of the
;< Yih-King." I venture to think that the work she
has done and is doing will be found no mean contri
bution to the advance of Christian learning.

It may be well here to point out that the history of
Louvain falls into two quite distinct periods, the old
and the new. The old University, entirely medieval
in form and constitution, founded by Pope Martin V.
and Duke John the Good of Burgundy in 1426, was
brought to a violent end by the French Revolutionary
invasion and the decree of suppression of October 27,
1797. In the interval of thirty-seven years which
elapsed an attempt was made, it is true, by the Dutch

i88 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

rulers of Belgium to revive a University, governmental
in character, in the old city, but the attempt was a
failure (1817-34). It was in 1834 that the Catholic
Church, by the hands of the Belgian hierarchy, modestly
began a revival of the old Alma Mater for a few
months in Mechlin, and then in Louvain itself, and
with such happy success that the eighty-six students
of the first year have grown to over 2,000 at the present
moment, with all the modern equipment, especially
in the domains of Natural and Applied Science, of a
great European seat of learning.

For old Louvain I have had little more to do than
condense the elaborate history of its Oriental teachers
contained in the exhaustive monograph of the venerable
Orientalist of the present Alma Mater, the late Pro
fessor Felix Neve, entitled " Memoire Historique et
Litteraire sur le College des Trois Langues a 1 Universite
de Louvain," which was crowned by the Royal Academy
of Belgium in 1856 (Bruxelles, Hayez, 1856, 4to.,
pp. xviii and 425*). For the earlier part, of course,
I have also used Valerius Andreas " Fasti Academici
Studii Generalis Lovaniensis " (Lovanii, 1650).

I. ORIENTALISM AMONG CATHOLIC SCHOLARS BEFORE

At the beginning of the sixteenth century Hebrew
and Rabbinical studies began to penetrate from the
Jewish to the Christian schools. Up to this date,
during the course of the Middle Ages, there were but a
few isolated scholars who ventured into the study of
Hebrew, and of these most were actually converted Jews.
There were serious difficulties which met the first
students of Hebrew. One was that it was necessary to
take lessons from Jewish rabbis, who exacted a great
price for their teaching. Moreover, such a proceeding
too often exposed the student to serious suspicions con-
* Tome XXVIII., " Memoires Couronnes," etc.

ORIENTAL STUDIES IN LOUVAIN 189

cerning orthodoxy on the part of his fellow Christians.
Lastly, there was the great dearth of books and texts.

Notwithstanding such drawbacks there is plenty of
evidence to show that Catholics cultivated Hebrew and
even its kindred tongues before the so-called Refor
mation. A well-known instance is that of Pico della
Mirandola (1463-94), whose acquaintance extended to
Arabic and Chaldaic, besides Hebrew. Reuchlin (1455-
1522) published his " Rudiment a Linguae Hebraicae "
in 1506 ; and when his frequent intercourse with Jewish
rabbis and his resistance to the decree for burning all
the rabbinical books of a converted Jew got him into
serious suspicion of heterodoxy and prosecution on part
of the Inquisition, he owed his protection to Leo X.
Spite of his persecution, he resisted the overtures of
Luther. Elias Levita, " the last and most celebrated
of the native (Jewish) grammarians " (1470-1549), had
Cardinal Egidio for his pupil and patron at Rome.
The great Polyglot of Jimenes (Ximenes) was pub
lished between 1514-17, and contains the Hebrew and
Chaldee texts of the various parts of the Old Testament.
The still superior Antwerp Polyglot, published by Plan tin
under the auspices of Philip II. (1569-72) contains, in
addition, the Syriac version of the New Testament.

Long before the above writers, Nicolaus de Lyra, a
converted Jew (died 1340), had published his " Postilla
Perpetua in Biblia Universa," which were found so
useful by Luther.*

II. THE BEGINNINGS OF ORIENTALISM AT LOUVAIN.

The earliest beginnings of Orientalism at Louvain
carry us back to nearly a century before the Antwerp

* For much of the above, see Gesenius, " Geschichte der
Hebraischen Schrift und Sprache " (Leipzig, 1851). For Roger
Bacon s knowledge of Hebrew and his Hebrew grammar, see
Nolan s and Hirsch s "The Greek Grammar of Roger Bacon,
and a. Fragment of his Hebrew Grammar." Cambridge : Uni
versity Press, 1902.

igo SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Polyglot above alluded to. And curious to say it is not
in the professional chair or the lecture-room that we
come across these beginnings, but in the printers
office. Louvain has all along been well equipped with
an Oriental press, never so well as at the present day,
with its double set of founts, owing respectively to
Beelen and de Harlez, of which we speak elsewhere.
The remote ancestor of this press must have existed
there almost at the time when Luther was born (1483),
for in the year 1488 there was issued a quarto volume
entitled " Epistola Apologetica Magistri Pauli de
Middleburgo ad Doctores Lovanienses," which is stated
to be printed in Alma Universitate Lovaniensi, per
Joannem de Westphalia. Now the curious fact is that
" the Hebrew quotations of this book are printed in
characters of a massive form and German cut, whilst
the Greek passages are written by hand " (Neve).
Evidently, then, there was in the Alma Mater a fount
of Hebrew type even before one of Greek characters.
It is easy to suppose who brought it. This John of
Westphalia (he died, by the way, next year, 1489), was
John Wesel or Wessel, of Groningen in Westphalia,
brought up at Zwolle under the influence of Thomas a
Kempis and the Brothers of the Common Life.* " In
the course of his wanderings he made a long sojourn at
Louvain, and must have taught Hebrew there, as he
did in other cities he visited Cologne, Heidelberg,
Paris, Rome, and Basel. "f J. Wessel, then, would appear
from this to merit the honour of having been both the
first teacher of Hebrew and the first printer of Hebrew
at Louvain. J

* He remained a staunch Catholic, and is not to be confounded
with John Wesel of Oberwesel, who fell away from the Church,
and died 1481, a prisoner of the Inquisition.

f See Hetzel s " Geschichte der Hebraischen Sprache und
Litteratur," p. 135 (Halle, 1776).

J Or were the printer and the Hebrew scholar different persons ?
This would seem to follow from a paper of Ed. van Even in the
" Dietsche Warande," vol. iii. (N.S.), p. 167, for the year 1890,

ORIENTAL STUDIES IN LOUVAIN 191

It is probable that in 1506 the press of Theodoricus
Martinus Alostensis (Thierry Martens of Alost) issued a
" Dictionarium Hebraicum sive Enchiridion Radicum
seu Dictionum Hebraicarum ex Joanne Reuchlino," a
quarto without name of author or year. This Martens
had printed at Louvain up to 1501 in partnership with
Hermann of Nassau.

Ten years later the first step was taken towards the
foundation of the first real Oriental school of Louvain.

The Trilingual College. Matthczus Hadrianus. In
1516 Erasmus came to Flanders, and the same year was
inscribed in the matriculum of the university, bringing
with him his doctor of theology s degree from Padua.
" Vivo," he writes next year to Pirckheimer, " versorque
Lovanii ; cooptatus in consortium Theologorum, licet
in hac Academia non sim insignitus titulo doctoris."
Indeed, as Valerius Andreas tells us,* he was engaged in
perpetual squabbles with these same theologians. How
ever, he did one good thing for them ; he brought about
the establishment of their first chair of Hebrew. The
very year of his arrival, 1516, he wrote to invite over
from Germany Matthaeus Adrianus (Erasm. " Epist,"
lit. hi., ep. 39, " Opera," t. iii. 353). This man was a
converted Jew of Spanish origin (born between 1470
and 1480). At Heidelberg he had proceeded to the
degree of doctor in medicine, and was there teaching
Hebrew. Erasmus in the above quoted letter recom
mended him to ^Egidius Buslidius (Giles Busleiden), for
the new " Trilingual College " just founded by the will
of his distinguished brother Jerome.

Here we must turn back a moment to say a word of
this celebrated college of the three languages (" des
Trois Langues "). Jerome Busleiden was a wealthy

when he records a printer, John of Westphalia, who, born at
Aken, near Paderborn, settled at Louvain in 1474, and worked
there till 1496. (Postscript to Frank s paper, " De Boekdruk-
kunst en de Geestelij kheid tot 1520.")

* " Fasti Academici Studii Generalis Lovaniensis," p. 85
(Lovanii, 1650).

IQ2 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

and enlightened ecclesiastic who had held high offices
in Church and State.* His love of learning induced him
to leave all his property to found a college at Louvain
for the special study of the three languages Latin,
Greek, and Hebrew. There were to be burses for the
support of the three professors and ten students. They
were to devote themselves to the study of grammar
and philosophy up to the degree of master," and were
to learn also the rudiments of Greek and Hebrew. The
idea was entirely new. It excited dreadful scandal
and opposition among the old-fashioned fogies of the
university. It was decried as " heretical " and what
not. Erasmus fought hard for it ; but there was every
chance of this " unicum nostrae regionis, imo totius
Csesareae ditionis ornamentum," as Valerius Andreas
styles it,f coming to an untimely end, but for the inter
position of Cardinal Adrian, an old Louvain student and
professor, soon after (1522) to ascend the Throne of
Peter as Pope Adrian VI. He summed up the whole
matter in a very simple, if somewhat obvious, " oracle,"
as Valerius Andreas calls it : " Bonas litteras non damno,
haereses et schismata damno." The college was there
fore opened near the fish-market and the academical
historian boasts with reason that " this praise is due to
our Busleiden : he was the first in Christendom to
establish a Trilingual College, though his example was
followed by others afterwards, as Francis I., King of
France, in Paris, Richard Fox, Bishop of Winchester,
at Oxford ;J Francis, Cardinal Ximenes, Archbishop of
Toledo, at Alcala," etc.

* Jerome Busleiden was the esteemed friend of the great
English Chancellor and Martyr, Blessed Thomas More, who
wrote three elegant little Latin poems in his honour, published
in his " Epigrammata," to be found in several editions of his
works. They are given in full by Neve, Appendix C. (pp. 384,385).

f " Fasti Academici," p. 277.

I I.e., Corpus Christi, 1516-17. Fox compared his college to
a beehive, and called his three professors " three gardeners."
See A. Zimmermann, S.J., " Die Universitaten Englands im
16 Jahrhundert," pp. 16-18 (Freiburg : Herder, 1889).

ORIENTAL STUDIES IN LOUVAIN 193

We have said above that Erasmus got the Chair of
Hebrew for Matthaeus Adrianus, who accordingly gave
his first lesson in the new college on September i,

It is noteworthy that the first regular teaching of an
Oriental language at Louvain began under the auspices
of the Faculty of Arts, and not of that of Theology.
This is a fact of some significance. It indicates, on the
one hand, that the study of Hebrew and its kindred
tongues was not looked upon at Louvain merely as an
appendage to the exegesis of Holy Writ, which has been
so long a popular impression among Catholics, but that
it had another and independent basis to stand upon
viz., that of a philological branch of learning ; and, on
the other hand, it indicates the strength and the breadth
of the spirit of the " new learning," the humanitarian
learning, which Erasmus did so much to foster at Louvain
as at Oxford and Cambridge. The position thus assigned
to Oriental studies has been maintained, and whilst at
all times they have been largely drawn upon at Louvain
to strengthen and elucidate exegetical and theological
studies, they have always enjoyed, over and above, a
position of their own as philological disciplines.

Matthaeus Adrianus does not seem to have got on
very well in his new home. He complained that he
lived there " for two years without resources." As a
matter of fact he taught for only a year and three
months. In July, 1519, he resigned his chair, and in
the December of the same year he went off to Wittem-
berg. " Conductus est Hadrianus, professor Lovani-
ensis," writes Melanchthon to Langius next year, 1520,
" qui apud nos Hebraica doceat."

We do not know much more of this primeval ancestor
(in the academic sense) of Mgr. Lamy. Did he become a
Lutheran, as Paquot says ? Where did he die ?

His Oriental works were not numerous. We know
only of (i) " Introductio Brevis in Linguam Hebraicam,"
8vo., no date ; also (2) " Oratiunculae tres : Dominica,

13

I 9 4 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Salutatio Angelica et Salve Regina hebraice redditae,"
4to., both published by Gryphius at Lyons.

As to his abilities, we have a glowing eulogy pro
nounced upon him by Erasmus, in the already quoted
epistle to Busleiden. He speaks of him as "so learned
in the whole Hebrew literature that, in my opinion,
there has not been any other in this age to compare with
him. He is not only a perfect master of the language,
but is so familiar with the most abstruse parts (adyta)
of the authors, that he has all their books at his fingers
ends " (" ac libros omnes sic habet in promptu ut digitos
unguesque suos ").

Two Englishmen at Louvain. It is an interesting fact
that the two occupants of the newly-founded chair of
Hebrew who immediately succeeded Adrianus were both
Englishmen, and connected with the national English
universities. Upon the withdrawal of Adrianus the
vacant professorship was conferred upon Robert
Wakefield. This person was a north of England man,
possibly a native of Yorkshire.* He had been educated
in his youth at Cambridge, where he had studied arts,
philosophy, and theology. Afterwards he, like so many
other scholars in the Middle Ages, went abroad to
various seats of learning ; but in his case it was a
particular taste for Oriental languages that was the
moving power. It is said that he had mastered Hebrew,
Chaldee, and Syriac.

Very short, however, was his stay at Louvain, for he
occupied the Hebrew Chair only four months August
to December, 1519. The next place we find him at
is Tubingen, where in 1522 he succeeded the very
celebrated Orientalist, Reuchlin ; but he did not stay
there long, either, in spite of the efforts of Duke Ferdi
nand of Wirtemberg to keep him. He seems to have
been of a roving disposition.

A word may be said of his subsequent career, which is
not very creditable. In 1524 he was back in Cambridge,
* See ante, p. 182.

ORIENTAL STUDIES IN LOUVAIN 195

and his Oriental and Biblical learning soon brought him
into the notice and favour of Henry VIII. , to whom he
became chaplain (a sacris). Later on he taught at
Oxford. It is regrettable to record that he strenuously
supported the King in the divorce case, writing a work
in favour of it (" Kotser Codicis," London, 1528) ; and
took an active part in the suppression of the monasteries.
Indeed, he was supposed to have plundered the library
of Ramsgate, and carried off, among other tomes, for
his own use, the Hebrew dictionary of Laurentius
Holbeccius. Fr. Zimmermann speaks of him as though
he had remained staunch to the Old Church, like his
brother Thomas, the first public professor of Hebrew at
Cambridge.* But at least his books were suspected of
dogmatic errors, and his conduct we have already seen.
He died in London in 1537 or 1538. Of his writings
we may record the following :

1. " Oratio de Laudibus et Utilitate trium Linguarum
Arabicae, Chaldaicae et Hebraicae, atque Idiomatibus
Hebraicis quae in utroque Testamento inveniuntur."
4to. Cantab. 1524. (This was his inaugral lecture at
Cambridge, and Neve says of it, " An interest of novelty
must no doubt have attached in his days to his com
parison of the three languages.")

2. " Paraphrasis in librum Koheleth (vulgo Ecclesi-
asten) succincta clara atque fidelis." 4to. (We shall
see further what a favourite study at Louvain was that
of Ecclesiastes.)

3. " Syntagma de Hebraeorum codicum incorrup-
tione." 4to. Oxonii. 1552 (posthumous).

We need not mention his theological and canonical
writings.

On leaving Louvain, Wakefield recommended a
fellow-countryman, Robert Shirwood, to succeed him.
This person was a native of Coventry, and had studied
at Oxford. His career at Louvain is summed up by
Valerius Andreas in a single sentence : " Post mensem
* " Universitaten Englands im 16 Jahrhundert," p. 124.

132

196 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

unum professionem inglorius deseruit." We know
nothing of his subsequent life, except that he probably
lived on for several years in Belgium, though he does
not seem (in spite of Pitts) to have taught again at
Louvain. As an author he was " a man of one book,"
viz., " Ecclesiastes La tine ad veritatem Hebraicam
recognitus, cum nonnullis annotationibus Chaldaicis et
quorumdam Rabbinorum sententiis." 4to. Antverpiae :
Vorstman. 1523.

It is noteworthy that, like his predecessor and suc
cessor, he chose the Book of the Preacher for com
mentary. His work* attained a certain celebrity, so
that it merited to be inserted by Pineda in his great
" Commentary on Ecclesiastes," published at Seville a
century later.

Thus, the close of 1519 saw the new Hebrew Chair
vacant yet again, three resignations having taken place
in one year ! It is also remarkable that the three first
Orientalist professors of Louvain were foreigners ; on
which Neve observes that the circumstance indicates
" at least the fraternity and free relations existing
between the great European seats of learning in the
Middle Ages."

* Dedicated to Abbot John Webb of Coventry.

VIII
OXFORD AND LOUVAIN

ON October 9, 1902, the writer had the privilege of attend
ing the special " Congregation " held in the Sheldonian
Theatre of Oxford, together with the representative of
fifty-six other universities, as delegate of the Catholic
University of Louvain. On that historic occasion he
had the honour to hand to the Vice-Chancellor of Oxford
a Latin letter, engrossed on vellum, of which the follow
ing is a translation :*

* The Latin text runs thus :

" VIRO NOBILISSIMO ILLUSTRISSIMOQUE DAVID B. MONRO,
VICE-CANCELLARIO UNIVERSITATIS OXONIENSIS.

" Trecentesimo redeunte nunc anno a condita insigni Biblio-
theca Bodleiana, TJniversitatis Catholicae Lovaniensis Rector
atque Magistri variis de causis muneris sui esse duxerunt peran-
tiquae et quasi cognatse Academise Oxoniensi laudes et grates
exhibere. Intra utramque enim scientiarum et artium scholam,
Oxoniensem nempe et Lovaniensem, jam inde a pristinis tem-
poribus, intima viguit mutui officii ac consuetudinis conjunctio.
In memoriam quidem revocasse juvabit jam saeculo decimo
quinto, Robertum Wilson Oxoniensem ad Universitatem nostram,
ante pauca decennia ab Martino Quinto fundatam, se contulisse
ibique anno 1472 juris lauream esse nactum. Haud multo post
alium ex vestris accepimus, Robertum Shirwood, qui quum
linguae Hebraicse studium apud nos mirum in modum promovit,
litterarum nostram orientalium scholam primus fundasse non
immerito reputatur. Quam multi prseterea ex alumnis magis-
trisque vestris, sseculo decimo sexto, exortis in Anglia religionis
causa dissidiis, Lovaniensem Academiam adiverint eamque
scriptis et doctrina ornaverint illius setatis testantur annales ;
hujusmodi fuere Thomas Harding, Richardus Smith, Nicolaus
Saunders, Joannes Storey, Joannes Clemens, Joannes Fowler,
aliiqui plurimi quos longius recensere hie minus est loci.

197

198 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

" On the occasion of the tercentenary of the founda
tion of the Bodleian Library, the Rector and Professors
of the Catholic University of Louvain consider it their
duty, for many reasons, to offer their congratulations
and thanks to the ancient and, so to speak, sister Univer
sity of Oxford. For there has existed from early times
an interchange of good offices and friendship between
the two seats of learning, Oxford and Louvain. It is

" Prsecipue porro in prsesens movet nos singulare nostri grati
animi debitum erga ipsius Bibliothecae Bodleianae instauratores
atque rectores. In hac enim completissima librorum area anno
1723 repositi fuere primi Avestici in Europam illati codices.
Quorum folia nonnulla exscripta et Parisiis servata quum in
manus incidissent clarissimi Anquetil Duperrpn, arduum hie
inivit consilium tanti pretii tantseque antiquitatis thesaurum
patriae suae acquirendi ; celebres itaque codices avesticos, summo
discrimine et ipse in India consecutus, tandem anno 1771 publici
juris fecit atque in vernaculam transtulit linguam. Hinc originem
duxerunt quaecunque ab initio sasculi elapsi, praeeunte Burnouf,
de sacrorum Iraniae librorum lingua atque doctrina in lucem
ediderunt viri rerum orientalium periti. Inter hosce non
innmum tenuisse locum clarissimum de Harlez jure merito
gloriatur Universitas Lovaniensis.

" At vero arctiori adhuc beneficiorum vinculo se Bodleianae
Bibliothecae esse adstrictos ex animo recordantur scholae nostrse
orientalis alumni atque magistri quibus inexhausti illius thesauri
praepositi summa benignitate liberum aperuerunt aditum ad
reconditos ibidem codices visendos atque exscribendos : recor
dantur clarissimi Abbeloos atque Lamy qui magni Ephraem
Edesscni insignia opera primum edenda inde prompserunt ;
recordatur hodiernus Lovaniensis Academiae Rector, qui antiquis
Coptorum scriptis explorandis operam impensurus, quid quid
juvaminis ac benevolentiae posset avere continue apud vos est
consecutus.

" In hujus memori animi documentum, recurrenti anniver-
saria die instauratae a Bodleio Bibliothecse Oxoniensis, simul
cum votis et gratulationibus nostris, munusculi gratia, ad vos
deferenda curavimus turn opera nonnulla ex codicibus Bod
leianis a nostratibus deprompta, turn ipsius nostrse Universi-
tatis annales scriptaque recentiora.

" Faxit Divina Providentia ut quaecumque Academiae Oxon-
iensi bona et prospera apprecamur perfecte adimpleantur.

" AD. HEBBELYNCK (Rector Universitatis).
" J. VAN BIERVLIET (Univ. a Seer.).

" Kal Oct., 1902."

OXFORD AND LOUVAIN 199

interesting to recall that in the fifteenth century an
Oxford scholar, Robert Wilson, came over to our
University, which had been founded but a few decades
before by Pope Martin V., and there took his degree in
Law in 1472. Not long after this we received another oi
your men, Robert Sherwood, who, owing to what he die!
to promote the study of the Hebrew language amongst
us, may not unjustly be looked upon as the founder of
our school of Oriental studies. Then, again, how many
of your scholars and professors in the sixteenth century,
owing to the religious dissensions which broke out in
England, retired to the Louvain University and adorned
it by their writing and teaching as testified by the annals
of the times ? Among these were Thomas Harding,
Richard Smith, Nicholas Saunders, John Storey, John
Clements, John Fowler, and many others whom it
would be too long to enumerate here.

" But at the present moment we are chiefly moved by
a sense of profound gratitude towards the founders and
directors of the Bodleian Library. For it was in this
splendid collection that, in the year 1723, was deposited
the first MS. of the Avesta brought to Europe. A few
folios of this were copied and taken to Paris, where they
fel] into the hands of the celebrated Anquetil Duperron,
whereupon the latter formed the venturesome resolution
of securing for his own country a treasure of such value
and so great antiquity. Having himself obtained in
India, at the cost of imminent dangers, valuable Avestic
Codices, he at length published them, with a French
translation, in 1771. This was the very beginning of all
that has been published by Orientalists, beginning with
Burnouf, during the last century, concerning the
language and doctrines of the sacred books of Iran.
Among these it is the glory of the University of Louvain
that the illustrious de Harlez held a distinguished place.

" Furthermore, the students and teachers of our school
of Orientalists are glad to recall that they are bound by
a still closer tie of benefits received, to the Bodleian

200 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Library, since the custodians of that inexhaustible
treasure-house have, with the greatest kindness, freely
granted them facilities for the examining and transcrib
ing of MSS. therein contained. Among these are
Abbeloos and Lamy, who copied here the inedited works
of the great St. Ephrem of Edessa,* and also the present
Rector of the University of Louvain, who, when engaged
in copying ancient Coptic MSS., received all possible
assistance and courtesy at your hands.

" As a testimony of this gratitude, on the anniversary
day of the foundation of the Oxford Library by Bodley,
we have caused to be forwarded to you, together with
our good wishes and congratulations, a small gift in the
shape of a few works edited by some of our men from
Bodleian MSS., and also the history and certain more
recent publications of our University. We pray that
Divine Providence may bestow abundance of all blessings
and prosperity on the University of Oxford.

" AD. HEBBELYNCK, Rector of the University.
" J. VAN BIERVLIET, Secretary of the University.
" October i, 1902."

The historical facts contained in the letter just quoted
appear to me to be of sufficient interest, from both the
religious and the educational point of view, to deserve a
fuller development and exposition, and the present paper
must be looked upon as merely a running commentary
upon the text of the letter quoted.

I.

The Louvain letter begins by hailing Oxford as both an
" ancient " and " sister " institution. Louvain herself is
by no means of modern creation : her history goes back
as far as the year 1425 ; but even so, Oxford can claim a
far more venerable antiquity. It is true that the myth
of her creation by King Alfred the Great has been long

* This statement is not quite accurate ; see further on.

OXFORD AND LOUVAIN 201

since exploded ; and all that we can say with certainty
is that the University appears to have come into exist
ence by a " secession " of scholars from the already-
existing University of Paris early in the thirteenth cen
tury, and that, without any regular or definite formal
erection, it developed as shown in a preceding article
(VI.). In any case, it is possible to obtain a volume,
published by the Clarendon Press, containing an alpha
betical list of " Oxford Honours " from as early a date
as 1220 to our time.* Thus, Oxford is more than two
centuries older than her sister University of Louvain.

Early in the fifteenth century the Low Countries, under
the enlightened rule of the Dukes of Burgundy or Brabant,
felt the pressing need for the intellectual and religious life
of their people of a university centre which should play
therein the part so long and so successfully played by
the universities in surrounding countries Paris in
France, Oxford in England, Cologne in Germany. It
would appear that several influential persons had for
some time been urging the desirability of the erection
of such a studium generate for the Flemish country, then
flourishing by its trade and commerce, and distinguished
by the intelligence of its population. Their representa
tions finally decided Duke John IV. to take in hand the
creation of such a centre of learning on the model of
those already existing in other countries. Duke John
entered into negotiations with Pope Martin V., and the
Bull of that Pontiff, dated December 9, 1425, beginning
with the words " Sapientise immarcessibilis," constitutes
the fundamental charter of the new University, thus
happily created by a joint action of the ecclesiastical
and the civil power. In his Bull, Martin V. describes
Louvain as a town "by the grace of God, so well endowed
with wealth, excellent climate, accommodation for large
multitudes, and well furnished with houses and all other

* "Oxford Honours, 1220-1894: being an Alphabetical
Register of Distinctions conferred by the University of Oxford
from the Earliest Times " (Oxford : Clarendon Press, 1894).

202 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

necessaries, that it seems to be most fitted and suitable
for receiving and housing such a university/

The various statutes and regulations for the conduct of
the newly-created Alma Mater were undoubtedly drawn
up upon the model of those in vogue in the already-
existing universities of Europe. In one respect, indeed,
Louvain was characterized by a feature which made it
very similar to our own Oxford. Unlike many other
seats of learning, it was a university of many colleges ;
in fact, at the date of its temporary suppression by the
French revolutionists in 1797, these colleges numbered
forty- four, many of which have long ceased to form a
part of the University.

As was only to be expected, Louvain, which grew and
prospered exceedingly, very soon entered into active
intellectual relationship with the other European seats
of learning. In those days all universities were more or
less international in character. Students of all nations
often poor " wandering scholars " passed from one
country to another, attracted by the fame of some great
teacher, and pursued their studies turn by turn at Paris
or Oxford, Bologna or Prague, Cologne or Louvain. As
indicated in the academic letter read above, the earliest
recorded Oxford man to proceed to a Louvain degree was
one Robert Wilson, a Bachelor of Laws, who, in 1472, is
recorded as having been promoted at Louvain to the
degree of LL.D., the Fasti of the University adding, with
unconscious humour, the characteristic trait that "having
received the doctrinal insignia, he gave a grand banquet
in the house of his president," one Jean de Grousselt
(" solemne epulum exhibuit in sedibus praesidentis
sui").*

The next recorded connection of any interest between
Oxford and Louvain is alluded to in somewhat too
flattering terms in the Rector s letter. " Not long after

* A somewhat later English student, who spent ten years at
Louvain, was Nicholas Wootton, afterwards Dean of Canterbury
and English Ambassador to Charles V.

OXFORD AND LOU VAIN 203

this," he writes, " we received another of your men,
Robert Shirwood, who, owing to what he did to promote
the study of the Hebrew language amongst us, may not
unjustly be looked upon as the founder of our school of
Oriental studies." This is far too complimentary a
reference to the Oxford scholar. I have already told
the somewhat curious story of this and another English
man in anothe rarticle.* I am afraid that the Rector of
Louvain was pushing courtesy to a somewhat extreme
point in conferring upon Shirwood the title of " founder
of our school of Oriental studies."

I have more than once mentioned the name of Eras
mus, the great humanist of the Low Countries, that
strange and enigmatical character, who played a part so
conspicuous, and yet so difficult to understand, in the
stirring t mes of the Renaissance. Erasmus forms the
most important connecting-link between Louvain on the
one hand and both Oxford and Cambridge on the other
during the early sixteenth century. In 1498 the great
scholar paid his first visit to Oxford and studied Greek
under Linacre, besides forming his long and intimate
friendship with Dean Colet and Sir Thomas More. During
his third stay in this country, Erasmus resided at Cam
bridge, where he held for a time both the Margaret
Professorship of Divinity and the chair of Greek. It is
well known how important an influence he exercised
upon the academic history of this country. His influ
ence at Louvain was no less marked. In a letter written
in 1521 he declares that Louvain was second to no
university in Europe except that of Paris : the number
of students was about three thousand, and this number
was growing every day. We have already seen him
exerc sing considerable influence in the appointment of
members of the university staff. From 1517 to 1521 he
lived and taught in Louvain, and it was during this
period that many of his most important and most learned

* " Two English Scholars and the Beginnings of Oriental
Studies at Louvain," ante, p. 195.

204 SKETCHES IN FIISTORY

works were produced. It was indeed a time of active
literary intercourse and correspondence between the
leading English and Flemish scholars.*

II.

But a far more and far closer connection between
Oxford and Louvain began with the religious troubles in
England, as indicated in the letter presented on the
occasion of the Bodleian Jubilee. The famous divorce
question, under Henry VIII., had its echo in Louvain.
Louis de Schore, who obtained his doctorate in Laws in
1531, published, in 1535, an elaborate report upon
Henry VIII. s marriage case,f whilst that case was under
trial at Rome, and is said on his tombstone, to have
been sent " regem legatus ad Anglum." From this time
forward Louvain became a place of refuge for those
English scholars, and sometimes their families, who
were compelled to fly from England, in many cases at
the sacrifice of high and important academic offices, for
conscience sake. The first of these was Richard Smith,
D.D., Regius Professor of Theology in the University of
Oxford, who fled to Louvain in the reign of Edward VI.
This distinguished scholar, whom Wood describes as
" the greatest pillar for the Roman Catholic cause in his
time," was a native of Worcestershire. He was obliged
to leave his Oxford professorship under Edward VI. " to
make way for Peter Martyr." He arrived in Louvain on
April 9, 1549, an d was f r some time a Professor of
Divinity there. On the death of Edward, he was re
called to England, restored to his professorship at Oxford,
and made chaplain to Queen Mary. " In Elizabeth s
reign," continues the above-quoted historian, " he was

* Of Joannes de Palude, of the Faculty 01 Arts, it is recorded
" vixit familiaris Thomae Moro," as well as with Erasmus. He
wrote an epistle about More s " Utopia."

f " Consilium super viribus Matrimonii inter Henricum VIII.
Anglorum Regem et Catherinam Austriacam " (Lovanii, typ.
Sessoni, 1535).

OXFORD AND LOUVAIN 205

committed to custody. Afterwards he went to Douay
in Flanders, and was constituted Dean of St. Peter s
Church there by Philip, King of Spain, who, erecting an
academy there about that time, made him the first
King s Professor thereof. He was accounted by his
persuasion the best schoolman of his time, and admirably
well read in the Fathers and Councils." The University
of Douay here mentioned was erected in 1562, and Smith
died there in July, 1573.

Another refugee under Edward VI. was the celebrated
John Clement, M.A., of Oxford, Professor of Greek and
Rhetoric at that University in the time of Wolsey. He
was also tutor in the family of Sir Thomas More, and
proceeded M.D. Twice did he seek refuge as an exile in
Louvain ; for, having returned to England under Queen
Mary and " practised physick in Esesx," he had to fly
again under Elizabeth. In 1570 he married at Mechlin
Margaret Giggs, and had one son and four daughters, one
of whom, Winifred, married Judge Rastell, to be men
tioned further on. Dorothy and Margaret became
nuns the latter at St. Ursula s, in Louvain, where,
as Sanders quaintly records, she was elected superior
over eighty sisters : "A junior over her seniors, an
Englishwoman over Germans."*

In 1562 there arrived in Louvain Thomas Harding,
D.D., of New College, Regius Professor of Hebrew at
Oxford, a native of Beconton, in Devonshire. In
Edward VI. s reign he was a Protestant, but under Mary
became a Catholic. On Elizabeth s accession he fled to
Louvain, where he remained for the rest of his life. He
died there in 1572, and was buried by the altar of the
Holy Trinity in St. Gertrude s Church, " where," says
Valerius Andreas, " his epitaph, engraved on a brass
plate, may still be read as follows :

* This Margaret Clement, together with Dorothy Harris, wife
of John Harris, Sir Thomas More s secretary, helped to bury the
body of More, " wrapped in a winding-sheet," after his martyr
dom. The whole Harris family, like the Clements, took refuge
in Louvain.

206 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

" Honesto loco natus, in Collegio Wilhelmi de Wyck-
ham educatus, Sacrae Theologiae Doctor et Hebraicae
Linguae Professor, ingenio abundans, disertus, acutus,
insignis Divini Verbi buccinator, Lovanii multos libros
adversus haereticos nostri temporis conscripsit, quorum
adiumento suis multum profuisse certum est. Obiit
sexagenarius studio et aegritudine fractus, quum religionis
nomine decennale pertulisset exilium, die 16 Septembris,

1572."

Nicholas Harpsfield, student of Winchester School and
of New College, Oxford, became fellow of the latter in
1536, B.C.L. in 1544, and two years later Regius Pro
fessor of Greek. Under Edward VI. he, like so many
others, fled to Louvain ; but, returning under Mary,
proceeded D.C.L. in 1553, and obtained many important
legal preferments in London. Under Elizabeth he was
cast into prison, and died there after several years.
Harpsfield was a voluminous writer.

A very interesting character among the emigres was
" Joannes Ramiger." Under this form the Flemish
annalist conceals John Ramridge, D.D. He was of
Merton College, Oxford, when he obtained his fellowship
in 1528, becoming Doctor of Theology in 1542, and
obtained several valuable preferments, including that
of Archdeacon of Derby. He was obliged to fly abroad
under Elizabeth, and settled in poverty at Louvain.*
His fate was a singular and unhappy one. On May 21,
1568, " in his extreme old age." he was going on foot to
Mechlin, when, at a place called Heveren, he was set
upon by some footpads, who had seen him giving alms
to a beggar, and cruelly murdered. His body, we are
told, was buried with great reverence by the clergy of
Mechlin.

William Rastell, born 1508, was the son of John
Rastell, printer and lawyer, and of Elizabeth, sister of Sir
Thomas More. In 1525 he went to the University of

* " Desertis bonis et honoribus, exul asperam vitam Lovanii
egit " is Molanus phrase.

OXFORD AND LOUVAIN 207

Oxford, but left without taking his degree, and set up as
a printer, as well as a man of law, in London. On the
accession of Edward VI. he retired to the continent and
settled in Louvain, where, as above stated, he married
Winifred Clement. Under Queen Mary he came back to
his native country and was made a puisne judge ; but
with Elizabeth s accession he had once more to retire to
Louvain, where he died. He was a notable printer. His
wife had already predeceased him in the reign of
Edward VI., and he erected a monument to her in the
Collegiate Church of St. Pierre, under the organ loft.
His death was a saintly one, and his body was laid to
rest by the side of that of his wife.

A much more celebrated emigre was Nicholas Saunders,
" the most noted defender of the Roman Catholic cause
in his time." He was a native of Charlewood in Surrey,
and about 1557 was Shagling Lecturer, or, as he himself
styles it, " tamquam Regius Professor " of Canon Law
at Oxford. About 1560 he retired to the Continent,
going first to Rome, where he was made priest and D.D.
Somewhat later he distinguished himself at the Council
of Trent, and accompanied Cardinal Stanislaus Hosius on
his legatine journey through Poland, Prussia, and Lith
uania. After this he came to Louvain, where he wrote
several important works. Saunders is noted for the
extreme bitterness of his attacks on Henry VIII. and
Queen Elizabeth, and certain of his statements contained
in his work on the Anglican schism have been thought
by some to be exaggerated. He has been described
as being " to Protestants what Foxe is to Catholics."
He lived in Louvain for about thirteen years as Professor
of Theology. His end was a strange and tragic one. In
1579 he was sent by Pope Gregory XIII. as legate to
Ireland, where, about 1580, he perished of hunger
" wandering in the mountaines," says Lord Burghley,
" and raving in a phrensy." Saunders is perhaps the
best known, as he was also the keenest, of the polemical
controversialists of those times.

208 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

In 1586 we find another refugee, one Robert Parkinson,
of Lincoln, promoted to the degree of D.D. at Louvain.

Perhaps the most illustrious of all these Oxford
refugees was John Storey, the martyr. He was educated
in the University of Oxford, chiefly at Henxey Hall ;
admitted B.C.L. in 1531, and in 1535 appointed to a
new chair of law founded by King Henry VIII. In 1537
he was chosen principal of Broadgate s Hall, and the
following year created D.C.L. In the beginning of
Edward VI. s reign, owing to his zealous defence of the
old religion,* he was obliged to withdraw into Flanders,
where he remained until the reign of Mary. He was then
recalled, and the patent of his professorship of Oxford
was restored to him, though he soon resigned it in order
to occupy important legal posts in London. On Eliza
beth s accession Dr. Storey was a member of the House
of Commons, and spoke so strongly against the Reforma
tion that he was cast into prison, but contrived to escape,
and settled for a time in Louvain, where he is quaintly
said by Molanus to have spent more time with the
Carthusians than at home with his wife. In 1570, being
at Antwerp, he was kidnapped on an English vessel
belonging to one Parker, brought over to England, com
mitted to the Tower, tried, and eventually hanged,
drawn and quartered at Tyburn (June i, 1571) under
circumstances of unusual atrocity, being of the age of
seventy years, f His family continued to live in Louvain.

John Fowler, a native of Bristol, was educated at
Winchester School and New College, Oxford, becoming a
fellow in 1555. Under Elizabeth, he too fled to Belgium,
and set up printing presses at Antwerp and Louvain. He

* Dr. Storey is recorded to have exclaimed at a public assembly
in the words of the preacher, " Woe to thee, O land, when thy
King is a child " (Eccles. x. 16). This exclamation caused such
an outburst of indignation that Storey realized that it was no
longer safe to remain in England.

f Blessed John Storey is one of the fifty-four English martyrs
beatified by Pope Leo XIII. on December 9, 1886. See an
excellent life of him by Dom Bede Camm, O.S.B., in his "Lives
of the English Martyrs," vol. ii. (1905), pp. 14-110.

OXFORD AND LOUVAIN 209

is spoken of as a man of learning, well skilled in both
Latin and Greek. He married Alice, daughter of John
Harris, the secretary of Sir Thomas More and of his wife
Dorothy, referred to on the preceding page.*

III.

I must now recall the fact that the occasion which
drew so many representatives of universities and learned
bodies to Oxford last October was the tercentenary of its
famous Bodleian Library. " At the present moment,"
said the Lou vain address, as above quoted, " we are
chiefly moved by a sense of profound gratitude to the
founders and directors of the Bodleian Library." The
history of this famous library, one of the six greatest
libraries of the world, forms one of the most interesting
chapters of literary history. Without in any way
detracting from the undoubted merits of the illustrious
and munificent donor whose name it bears, it is only fair

* I have, of course, limited my remarks above to Oxford men
at Louvain. Other English exiles, however, likewise sought
refuge there. Such were Cuthbert Scott, D.D., Bishop of Chester,
a Cambridge man, buried in the church of the Friars Minor, whose
epitaph ran :

" Anglia Cuthbertum peperit nomine Scotum ;
Sed natale solum tribuit Northumbrica tellus.
Pagina sacra habuit doctorem Cantabrigensem ;
Cestria pontificem, necnon Ecclesia gemmam ;
Integritas vitae Benardum reddidit orbi ;
Eloquio visus nobis Chrysostomus alter."

Another Cambridge man was Henry Jolliffe, Dean of Bristol
and Almoner to Queen Mary, who died in 1573, and lies buried
in the Church of St. Michel, Louvain. Of Robert Giles, whose
tomb and epitaph are in the same church, " legum Angliae pro
fessor egregius," and who, dying in 1578, in his forty-fourth
year, left one daughter, " ex conjuge sua carissima Wenthana,
Thomae Stradlynge, equitis aurati apud Wallos meridionales in
majori Brittannia olim strenuissimi, filia," I cannot find whether
he was an Oxford or a Cambridge man (perhaps neither). Gillow
does not mention him in his Dictionary (but see Catholic Record
Society, vol. i., 1905).

Other Louvain refugees, like the Earl of Westmoreland and
Lady Jane Dormer, do not belong to my present subject.

14

210 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

to say that Sir Thomas Bodley was the restorer rather
than the founder of Oxford s University library. The
fact was emphatically acknowledged, both in many of the
academical orations made at the centenary and in the
handsome record published by the Clarendon Press on
that occasion,* that the first creation of a university
library or libraries at Oxford goes much further back, to
Catholic times and Catholic Churchmen, and that the
destruction thereof was owing to Protestant fanaticism
at the Reformation.

" Before any actual building had in earlier days been
assigned for the purpose, benefactors had made some
provision for needy scholars, to whom the purchase of
books lay beyond their means, by gifts of MSS., which
were preserved in chests within the precincts of St.
Mary s Church, and were to be lent out under sufficient
pledges for safe return. The earliest name of such a
donor which has been handed down is that of Rogerus de
Insula, Chancellor of the diocese of Lincoln (in which
Oxford then lay) in 1217-20, and afterwards, till his death
in 1235, Dean of York. He gave several copies of the
Bible. About a hundred years later, Thomas Cobham,
Bishop of Worcester, began (some seven years before his
death, which occurred in 1327) to make preparation for
building a room (now existing on the north of the chancel
of St. Mary s Church) over a chapel then used as the
meeting-place of the congregation of the University ;
and, upon his decease, he left money and books towards
the carrying out of his purpose. "f

The library, thus inaugurated by a Catholic dean and
a Catholic bishop, received its most important develop
ment under an enlightened Catholic prince and from
other Catholic bishops,

" Only a few years elapsed before the library, thus

happily begun, outgrew its narrow accommodation. For

when the university, upon commencing the erection of

the noble Divinity School, sought the aid of Humfrey,

* " Pietas Oxoniensis." f Ibid., p. 8.

OXFORD AND LOUVAIN 211

Duke of Gloucester, as being the known encourager of
learning, he not only contributed money liberally for
that purpose, but began also, in 1439, to forward books
for the library, in which year his first donation comprised
129 volumes, worth, as Convocation said in a letter of
thanks addressed to the Parliament, a thousand pounds
and more. And as continuous gifts followed, amounting,
before the Duke s death in 1447, to a total of about
600 volumes (besides some received subsequently),
the need of a larger room became pressing. To the
Duke, therefore, in 1444, Convocation turned again, and
prayed for help to erect and furnish, over the Divinity
School, a chamber which would be better fitted for the
housing and the use of his precious gifts help which
would indeed make him that which he should solemnly
be styled, Founder of the Library. It was but slowly
after the great patron s death that the work went on,
the books in the old library being meanwhile chained
in 1454 ; and at length, after additional gifts had been
received (especially from Thomas Kempe, Bishop of
London), in 1488 Duke Humfrey s library was opened,
and at once received a further considerable gift of books
from Archdeacon Richard Lichfield."*

" Kempe gave not only books, but 1,000 marks to
complete the school of which the library formed the
upper storey ; and in 1437 the University, in a letter to
him, calls it tuam novam librarian! (Anstey, Epis-
tolae Academicse, ii., 533). In 1478 the University
bound itself to commemorate, by annual Masses, etc.,
not only Kempe himself after his death, but also his
uncle, John Kempe, Archbishop of Canterbury."! I
wonder what has become of those Masses now.

It is interesting to remark that the central portion of
the Bodleian Library still bears the name of the " good
Duke." Only sixty- two years passed when, as the
Public Orator, the Rev. Dr. Merry, Rector of Lincoln
College, said in his Latin oration : " Sad times fell upon
* Op. cit., p. 6. f Ibid., n. i.

142

212 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

the University when superstition and ignorance com
bined to destroy what learning and munificence had
created." The superstition and ignorance were those of
the Royal Commissioners of King Edward VI. The
precious books and manuscripts that had been collected
with such care and at such cost through the munificence
of princes and prelates were, in 1550, condemned as
Popish by these Commissioners, and either destroyed or
sold ; many of them, as they were of parchment, were
cut up and used as measuring-tapes by tailors. Even
the woodwork of the old library was broken up and sold
for timber in 1556, so that nothing was left but the four
bare walls ; and, to quote again the " Pietas Oxoni-
ensis," " the place chosen of old for quietness that fitted
it for study remained abnormally quiet for lack of any
thing to be studied."*

The name of the boy-king, Edward VI., has been
handed down in the popular tradition as that of a
great patron of learning, owing to a certain number of
grammar-schools founded in his reign and under his
name. The sad story of the old Oxford library is a
striking confirmation of the contention of Catholic (and
other) historians that this apparent royal munificence
was more than counterbalanced by the fanaticism and
rapacity of Edward or rather of his ministers which
plundered wholesale the goods of the Church. After
this we can the better appreciate the bitter exclamation
of Dr. John Storey, then Principal of Broadgate s Hall :
" Woe to thee, O land, when thy King is a child !"
which we quoted just now.

These excesses of Protestant bigotry and fanaticism
were very soon after made good by the enlightened
generosity and devoted zeal of Sir John Bodley, himself a
Protestant of Protestants, who dedicated a considerable
portion of his life to the restoration of the library, or, as
we may truly say, to the creation of a new one, which
now deservedly bears his name, and ranks as one of the
* op. dt , p. 7.

OXFORD AND LOUVAIN 213

greatest and most precious treasure-houses of books and
MSS. in the world. It was opened in 1602, so that in
1902 we were worthily celebrating its third centenary.

The Louvain letter indicates an extremely subtle his
torical connection between this restored library of Bodley
and the modern intellectual development of the Belgian
University, and expresses on that account " a sense of
profound gratitude towards the founders and directors
of the Bodleian Library." As the story here referred to
forms one of the most romantic chapters of literary
history, I must endeavour, as briefly as I can, to
narrate it.

In 1718 one Richard Bourchier, an English merchant
in India, purchased from some Parsis a MS. of one of
their sacred books, the " Vendidad," in a language and
character then unknown in Europe, and sent it by one
Mr. Richard Cobbe, in 1723, to the Bodleian Library in
Oxford, where it is still preserved. There it lay for
several years a mere useless curiosity ;* but in 1754, by
some means or other, I know not how, a facsimile of
four leaves of this MS. found its way to Paris, and was
exposed in a glass case in the Bibliotheque du Roi.
Here it was seen by an impulsive and enthusiastic young
French scholar, Abraham-Hyacinthe Anquetil du Perron,
little more than twenty years of age at the time, and
enkindled in him a fire of zeal which has had far-reaching
consequences in the subsequent history of European
learning. He knew, of course, what everybody else
knew, that this codex formed a portion of the sacred
books of an ancient and once mighty religion of the East,
that bore the name of a great prophet and reformer,
known to the ancient Greeks as Zoroaster, and who was
supposed to have lived at a date of fabulous antiquity
a religion that at one time was the national faith of the

* It is still preserved there. At my visit in 1902, through the
kindness of Mr. E. B. Nicholson, Bodley s Librarian, I had the
pleasure of handling and examining this historically precious
manuscript.

214 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

great Persian empire, and about which much had been
written from the days of Herodotus, the father of history,
down to those of Hyde at the close of the seventeenth
century. The early fathers and ecclesiastical writers,
too, had preserved the Eastern tradition that the Magi
or Wise-Men who came to adore Christ in Bethlehem
belonged to this faith. But strange and discordant,
often grotesque and exaggerated, were the statements
scattered through history about it and its founder. It
was known that the Parsis, the so-called Fire Worship
pers of India, were the remnants of the adherents of the
once Imperial faith, long since crushed and almost
exterminated by Mohammedanism, who had found a
refuge on Indian shores. They were believed to possess
the sacred writings of Zoroaster and his disciples, as well
as the knowledge of the long- forgotten languages in
which they were preserved. But the Parsi priests
jealously guarded their treasures, and even though in one
or two rare instances they were persuaded to sell MSS.
of their books, nothing had ever induced them to divulge
what they knew of their language or contents. Anquetil
du Perron was now fired with the ambition to win for
his country the glory of wresting from the suspicious
priesthood who guarded them the secrets of the old-
world faith, and of laying before the learned world a
complete account of the Zoroastrian doctrines, based on
the actual testimony of the ancient books themselves.
So great was his impatience that he enlisted as a common
soldier in the French East India Company, quitting Paris
with his company (men whom he speaks of as " ces
brutaux "), and with no further luggage than a few
books, two shirts, two handkerchiefs, and a pair of socks.
Reaching 1 Orient on November 16, 1754, he was grati
fied to learn that the King had allowed him a subsidy of
500 livres and a free passage to India. He did not sail,
however, till February 7, 1755, nor reach Pondicherry
till August 9, after a voyage of six months. Seven long
years he spent in India, chiefly in Surat, which he reached

OXFORD AND LOUVAlN 215

in 1758. Facing every kind of difficulty and discourage
ment, suffering sickness, opposition, perils of war, and
even personal violence, never once did he swerve from
his self-imposed task. On the part of the dasturs, or
Parsi priests, he met with vexatious delays, fraud, extor
tion, and evasion : still he persevered. His extraordi
dinary courage and industry were rewarded. He learned
the Persian language, and, in addition, whatever the
Parsis knew of their two ancient sacred languages now
known to us as Zend and Pehlevi. He obtained com
plete copies of all that remained of their sacred books,
translated them into French, and collated many MSS.
Although England and France were at war at the time,
and Surat was captured by the former during his stay
there, it is pleasing to record that he received much help
and friendly protection from the English, and finally, on
April 23, 1761, it was owing to English help that he was
able to sail from Bombay with his precious treasures
(including 180 MSS.) on board the Bristol, arriving at
Portsmouth on November 17 of the same year. For a
short time, through some misapprehension, he was
detained as a prisoner of war, owing to the hostilities
proceeding between the two countries, but was soon
released. He would not, however, leave England before
visiting Oxford to inspect and compare the Avestic MSS.
there preserved. After a stay of two days, he returned
by Portsmouth and London to Gravesend, whence he
embarked for Ostend on February 14, 1762, reaching
Paris just a month later. He deposited his MSS. in the
Bibliotheque du Roi, and set to work to publish the
results of his long years of labour. After nine years toil,
there appeared in 1771 his great work in three volumes,
destined to bring about almost a revolution in philo
logical and historical science. It is true the work was
full of mistakes and imperfections, not so much through
Anquetil du Perron s own fault, as through that of his
Parsi teachers, whose knowledge of their own classical
languages was singularly imperfect and incorrect. Thus,

216 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

when his translation of the " Sacred Books of the
A vesta " appeared, it met with much scepticism and even
ridicule ; instead of a work of profound philosophy, it
appeared to many of his readers a mere farrago of puerile
fables, tedious formulae, and grotesque prescriptions. A
famous young Oxford scholar, Sir William Jones, who
later on became the greatest Orientalist of his day, pub
lished a letter in exquisite French in which he poured
forth with all the wit and bitterness of a Voltaire the
vials of almost ferocious ridicule and obloquy upon
Anquetil. In fact, he made out that his work was a
forgery, and this view was long held by many distin
guished scholars. For several years the battle raged
over the question of the genuineness or the contrary of
the language which Anquetil had thus revealed to the
scientific world. Among the scholars who defended
Anquetil it is interesting to find the name of the learned
Carmelite Father Paulinus di San Bartolommeo,* who,
in an essay published in Rome in 1798, not only
defended the genuineness of the Avestic language, but
even indicated, what was later on to be so abundantly
proved, its affinity with the Sanskrit.

Time has abundantly avenged the good faith and sub
stantial accuracy of Anquetil du Perron, and the cruel
diatribe of Sir William Jones is now nothing more than
a literary curiosity. The rich collections of MSS.
deposited in the Paris Library by Anquetil du Perron
were studied by one scholar after another, until
the great Eugene Burnouf definitely placed Avestic
philology on a permanent and certain basis. The
language of the Avesta, the so-called Zend, was exhaus
tively studied, its phonetics and grammatical principles
duly recorded and explained, and it took its rightful place
by the ^ side of its sister idiom, Sanskrit, the sacred
language of ancient India. Thus was Bopp, the father
of the modern science of comparative philology, able to

* Author of the first Sanskrit Grammar ever printed (Rome :
Propaganda Press, 1790).

OXFORD AND LOUVAIN 217

utilize it in the compilation of his epoch-making work,
" The Comparative Grammar of the Indo-Germanic
Languages," and even up to the present day the study of
Zend is indispensable for a proper understanding of the
history and development of that most important group
of languages known to us as the Aryan, or Indo-European
family.

No less far-reaching have been the effects of Anquetil
du Perron s revelation upon another most important
modern branch of learning, the Comparative History of
Religions. The sacred books of the Avesta, or, rather,
what portions of them have survived the wreck, together
with a very considerable proportion of the explanatory,
theological, or patristic literature belonging to the after
ages of the Zoroastrian faith, and composed in the
medieval language known to us as Pehlevi, have, during
the course of the nineteenth century, been studied, pub
lished, translated, and commented upon by numerous
scholars of every nationality. The dogmas and moral
precepts, the ceremonial and liturgical prescriptions of
the great Zoroastrian creed, are now fully known, and
form one of the most valuable as well as most inter
esting chapters of the history of religions. Now, it is one
of the peculiar glories of the modern University of
Louvain resuscitated in 1834 after its temporary sup
pression by the French Republicans, as recorded earlier
on to have played an important part in the develop
ment of Avestic studies, whether from the philological or
the theological point of view, through the labours of its
most illustrious modern son, the late Charles de Harlez.
As a young priest, this gifted scholar, forced, by ill-health
and a serious throat affection which never left him, to
abandon the work of the parochial ministry, threw him
self, with all the ardour of his nature, into those studies
which had been inaugurated by Anquetil du Perron, and
raised to the highest scientific level by Burnouf, Wester-
gaard, and Spiegel, of whom de Harlez may be considered
to have been intellectually, though not actually, the

218 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

pupil. In 1874 de Harlez joined the staff of the Louvain
University and began his great work, the French trans
lation of the Avesta, which, with his many subsequent
publications, have exercised a profound influence upon
the course of Zend studies in Europe, and upon no man
more than upon the famous Darmesteter, though that
strange genius would have been the last to acknowledge
his indebtedness. But it is chiefly as the reformer of the
intellectual life of Louvain that de Harlez comes before
us in this paper. With a single exception of the great
biologist Carnoy, there is no man whose intellectual
power has so remodelled the higher studies in that Uni
versity as Charles de Harlez. What the one did for the
natural sciences, the other did for the philological and
historical ones ; and it has been said, without much
exaggeration, that de Harlez left Louvain on his death in
1899 a hundred years ahead of what he found it on his
arrival in 1874. If, then, that illustrious scholar owes
his fame and his power to his Avestic studies, it is
surely not incorrect, fanciful though the idea may seem,
to trace, like an electric current, the intellectual in
fluence which he exercised, back through the school of
Burnouf, the labours and genius of Anquetil du Perron,
and the now historical " four facsimile leaves," to the
Bodleian MS. and its home in that literary treasure-
house, erected three hundred years ago by the enlight
ened munificence of Sir John Bodley. Was it too far
fetched on the part of the Louvain University to express
in its letter its " profound gratitude " to the Bodleian
for having supplied the tiny seed whence have sprung
the rich intellectual gifts which she now enjoys ?

IV.

However poetical this idea may seem, there is no doubt
about the prosaic reality of the good services acknow
ledged in the concluding paragraph of the address. It is
well known that the Bodleian has become one of the

OXFORD AND LOUVAIN 219

richest storehouses of MSS., particularly of rare and
valuable Oriental codices, in the world, with which but
three or four of the greatest libraries in Europe can vie.
Hence it is that scholars come from all parts to examine,
collate, or copy these manuscript treasures. It is true
that the Bodleian, by one of the fundamental articles of
its constitution, can never lend a single volume of any
kind outside of its own walls ; and history records the
two interesting occasions when, first of all King Charles I.
and some years later the mighty Protector Oliver
Cromwell, on applying for the loan of a volume, were each
in turn stoutly refused, on the strength of this regulation,
by the unflinching librarians of their day ; and though
neither Charles nor Oliver were men to brook lightly a
contradiction of their wills, it is to the credit of both that
they each gracefully acquiesced and respected the
founder s law. On the other hand, scholars, whether
English or foreign, wishing to work in the library, are
ever received with all kindness and courtesy. Members
of the Louvain University, among others, have in our
own times, as indicated in the address, availed themselves
of this privilege. One or two instances are referred to by
name. The distinguished Professor of Holy Scripture
and the Semitic Languages, Mgr. T. J . Lamy, during the
past few years has published the hitherto inedited hymns
and sermons of the greatest of the Syrian Doctors of the
Church, St. Ephrem of Edessa. This fine edition, con
taining the original Syriac texts, with Latin translation,
notes, and commentaries, is based upon a number of
codices in various European libraries, and among them
the Bodleian.* Mgr. A. Hebbelynck, who, as the

* " Sancti Ephraem Syri Hymni et Sermones, quos e codicibus
Londiniensibus, Parisiensibus . . . et Oxoniensibus descriptis
edidit " Thomas Josephus Lamy (Mechliniae, Dessain, 4 vols.,
1882-1902). There is an inaccuracy in the Louvain address in
quoting Mgr. Abbeloos as a collaborator in this important work.
It was in the similar edition of the Ecclesiastical Chronicle of
Bar-Hebrgeus, or Abu l-Faraj, the greatest of the Syrian his
torians, that Abbeloos, Lamy s most distinguished pupil, co-

220 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

present Rector Magnificus, signs the address quoted
above, has also been indebted to the courtesy of the
authorities of Bodley s Library, whilst copying or col
lating some of its Coptic MSS., one of which, an exceed
ingly curious, quasi-gnostic treatise on the " Mysteries
of the Greek Alphabet," he published in text and trans
lation in 1902.*

It was as a fitting and graceful acknowledgment of
these and other services that the University of Louvain
entrusted its delegate, in addition to the Latin address,
with a selection of some dozen bound volumes of publica
tions of members of its staff, for presentation to the
Bodleian Library, among them being, naturally, the
works just described.

What I have written above will, I think, suffice to
show the continuous traditions of friendly intercourse
and reciprocal services which, for nearly four and a half
centuries, have existed between the ancient University
of Oxford and her younger, though venerable, sister
University of Louvain ; and it is possible, perhaps, to
trace a long-linked chain of intellectual and moral cause
and effect between the going of Robert Lincoln, the
Oxford bachelor, to Louvain in 1472, and the sending by
Louvain of her delegate to share in the joys of the Oxford
celebration of 1902, after an interval of precisely 430
years.

operated with the latter thirty years ago (" Gregorii Barhebraei
Chronicon Ecclesiasticum "... conjuncta opera ediderunt
Abbeloos et Lamy," Lovanii, Peeters, 3 vols., 1872-1877), but
the text published was that of a British Musuem codex not of
a Bodleian MS.

* " Les Mysteres des Lettres Grecques d apres un Manuscrit
Copte Arabe de la Bibliotheque Bodleienne d Oxford " (Louvain :
Istas, 1902).

OXFORD AND LOUVAIN 221

BOOKS TO BE CONSULTED.

Pietas Oxoniensis : In Memory of Sir Thomas Bodley, Knt.,

and the Foundation of the Bodleian Library. Oxford : at

the University Press, October, 1902.
MGR. HEBBEI.YNCK, Recteur Magnifique de 1 Universite. " Dis-

cours prononce au Grand Auditoire du College du Pape

Adrien VI., le 15 Octobre, 1902." Louvain : Van Linthout,

1902.
DOM ADAM HAMILTON, O.S.B. " Chronicle of the English

Augustinian Canonesses at Louvain." Edinburgh and

London : Sands, 1904.
DOM BEDE CAMM, O.S.B. "Lives of the English Martyrs."

2 vols. London: Burns and Oates, 1904-5.
THE CATHOLIC RECORD SOCIETY. "Miscellanea," i. London,

1905.

IX

THE LITANY OF LORETO AND ITS HISTORY

AMONG the most popular devotions of the Catholic
Church is unquestionably that form of prayer known
to us as the " Litany of Lore to." This favourite prayer
in honour of the Mother of God is one of the four litanies
which, by recent decrees of the Holy See, are the only
ones allowed to be used in public devotions viz., the
ancient Litany of the Saints, the Litany of Jesus, the
Litany of the Sacred Heart, and the Litany of Loreto.
Of these, of course, only the first is, strictly speaking,
of liturgical rank, forming as it does an integral part
of many of the liturgical and pontifical offices of the
Church. The Litany of the Blessed Virgin, or of
Loreto, has, however, come to enjoy a quasi-public,
though extra-liturgical, character, owing to the fact
that it has become, by popular usage, almost an in
variable portion of the service of Benediction of the
Blessed Sacrament. Moreover, in late years Pope
Leo XIII. officially ordered the recitation of this
Litany, together with the Rosary, in all churches during
the month of October (Encyclical Supremi Apostolatus,
September I, 1883). This is the first occasion upon
which the recitation of this litany has been made in any
way obligatory. Over and above the official authority
which now attaches to the Litany of Loreto, there can
be no question of the extreme popularity which it enjoys
among Catholics all over the world, largely on account
of its own intrinsic beauties and of the thoroughly

222

THE LITANY OF LORETO 223

devotional spirit which pervades it. It is no wonder,
therefore, that both the contents and the history of
this litany have formed the subject of quite a remarkable
number of theological and historical treatises during a
space of well-nigh three centuries, from the earliest
writer, Pierre Geoffrey, whose meditations on the Litany
of Loreto were published at Bordeaux in 1607, and
Justinus Michoviensis (1630), down to the modern works
of Himmelstein (Wiirtzburg, 1876) and the more recent
and exhaustive essays of Josef Sauren (1895) and of
de Santi (1900).* Indeed, the present paper will be
little more than a brief summary of the interesting
investigations and conclusions so clearly and concisely
set forth by the former author, though these have been
keenly criticised and frequently corrected by de Santi.
It may be of some interest to know that among the
earlier writers on this subject was one Dr. William
Smith, whose dissertation on four of the petitions of the
Litany of Loreto was published at Antwerp in 1767. f

The term " litany," as the name of a form of prayer,
goes back to the most ancient times, even to pagan
writers before the Christian era. It is a Greek word,
used by the historian Dionysius of Halicarnassus, who
nourished a few years before Christ e.g., in narrating
the famous history of Lucretia.f (Antiq. Rom., lib. iv.,
cap. 67.) In the early Christian Church the word
appears to have been used chiefly, if not exclusively, for
processions, or else for prayers publicly recited during

* See list at end of article.

f " Dissertatio in hsec quatuor Litaniarum quas vulgo Laure-
tanas appellamus commata : Vas spirituale, vas honorabile, vas
insigne devotionis, rosa mystica " (Antverpise, 1767).

J TToXXds Xircii/ei as . . . TTOiTja-a^vrj. The word is chiefly used
as a plural in Christian usage (Lat. litanice, It. litanie, Fr. litanies,
in its ecclesiastical sense) ; also Sp. litania and litanias. Portu
guese is peculiar ladainha.

In this sense O. Ital. letanie, as in Dante, " Inferno," xx. 9.
In a document of A.D. 1092, quoted by Muratori (" Annali
d ltalia," v. 222), we read : " Quandocunque letanice veniebant

224 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

processions, and naturally consisting chiefly of repe
titions of invocations. It is generally believed that the
custom of processions with recitations of litanies took
its rise at Vienne in France about 450, under St. Mamer-
tus, during the terrible days of earthquakes, pestilence,
famine, and fire which struck so much terror throughout
Gaul during the fifth century, and again under his
successor, St. Avitus, in 519. This was the origin of the
Rogation Days, the observance of which is believed
to have spread from Gaul to Rome, where Gregory the
Great first brought them into general use. There is
reason to believe that in the earliest times these liturgical
litanies consisted solely of the repetition of the invoca
tions Kyrie eleison, Christe eleison, and that the names
of saints and petitions were added somewhat later. Be
this as it may, there can be no doubt that the Greater
Litanies, or Litanies of the Saints, though not exactly
in the forms we have them now, are the most ancient in
the Church.

It is an interesting question to ask what is the
antiquity of the Litany of Loreto. My readers will
probably be surprised to learn that the difference of
opinions which prevails among writers on this subject
is extreme. The well-known ecclesiastical writer, Bin-
terim, actually carried the origin of this litany back
to Apostolic times. Fr. Hutchison (" Loreto and
Nazareth," London, 1863), and Dr. Northcote (" Shrines
of the Madonna ") both agree upon the beginning of the
fifth century. Auguste Nicolas, in his celebrated book
on the Blessed Virgin, thinks that they were in use
in the sixth century under Gregory the Great, and
were sung in procession during a time of pestilence, a
clear confusion with the Litany of the Saints above
referred to. Scherer, Schneider-Beringer, and Moroni,
in his great dictionary, all agree in speaking of its

ad San Donatum . . . audiebant Missam." And 1 Imolese, in
his note to the above passage of Dante : " Qui vadunt in letaniis
ambulant lente."

THE LITANY OF LORETO 225

venerable antiquity, and refer to it as belonging to the
earliest centuries. Moroni and Glaire further assert
that Pope Sergius I., in 637, ordered this litany to be
publicly recited on the feast of the Annunciation.
Other writers admit that it is doubtful whether the
existence of the Litany of Loreto can be traced before
the year 1294, the traditional date of the translation
of the Holy House to that town. The writer whose
essay I am now summarising, Herr Sauren, has under
taken a thorough investigation of these different views,
with results that are somewhat surprising. Speaking
generally, we may say that his careful investigation of
historical sources has led to a conclusion entirely fatal
to the supposed great antiquity of the Litany of Loreto,
and indeed to what appears to me the unavoidable con
clusion that this devotion is not only not very ancient,
but that it is, comparatively speaking, modern.

Of course, it must be understood that we are here
speaking of the actual Litany of Loreto as an organic
whole. Not only is the form of public supplication
known as " litanies " of the highest antiquity, but even
litanies of Our Lady, remarkably similar to our present
ones, are to be found all through ecclesiastical literature.
It is very interesting to know that the oldest of all
litanies of Our Blessed Lady now extant is an old Irish
one, going back to the eighth century, preserved in the
" Leabher Breac," in the Royal Library of Dublin, and
published in the old Irish text, with English and Latin
translations, in 1879. This ancient litany is one of great
beauty, containing sixty invocations, some identical
with, others very similar to, those in our own form of
the Litany. A version of this old Irish litany, together
with several others of various dates, is given in the
appendix to Sauren s Essay. Among them it may be
worth while mentioning a litany contained in the works
of St. Bonaventure, another extracted by de Rubeis from
an ancient codex of Frejus, a third contained in an office
of Our Lady, printed by Dulcibello in 1503, and others

15

226 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

extracted from various similar sources. All these have
many points of close analogy with our Litany of Loreto,
but all differ considerably, some even very widely from it.

We will now follow our author in endeavouring to
ascertain the historical data which are at hand for the
certain history of the Litany we now possess. The
earliest real historical date for this Litany is a statement
by Vicenzo Murri in his Dissertation upon the identity
of the Santa Casa (Loreto, 1791), to the effect that in
the year 1489 a large silver plate bearing the name of
Paolo Savelli, Prince of Albano, was sent as an offering
to the shrine, having engraved upon it our present
Litany of Loreto.* Martorelli, who wrote in 1743, also
states that according to some authorities the Litany
was composed in 1493.

On the occasion of the laying of the foundation-
stone of the marble building which enshrines the Holy
House, in 1531, the Chapter of Loreto, according to the
testimony of an eye-witness, Lauren tius, " sang the
Litany of the Virgin Mary."

In 1547 Giovanni d Albona, Canon of Loreto, made a
foundation with the Augustinians of Recanati to say or
sing every Saturday a mass in honour of Our Lady
" together with her Litanies." Raffaele Riera, S.J.,
who from 1554 onwards was penitentiary at Loreto, in
his history of the " Santa Casa," mentions a litany of
Our Lady which the pilgrims to Loreto were in the habit
of singing.

It is certainly remarkable to find that the above
quoted dates are the very earliest which can be found
connecting a litany of Our Lady with Loreto and the
Santa Casa. I say a litany because it is not yet quite
certain whether each one of the litanies just mentioned
was identical with our present Litany or not.

On February 8, 1578, a copy of the Litany of Loreto

was sent to Rome accompanied by a letter of Giulio

Candiotti, arch-priest of Loreto, petitioning that this

Litany might be introduced into the churches of Rome.

* See, however, De Santi, pp. 15-20.

THE LITANY OF LORETO 227

Candiotti writes (Vatican Library, cod. reg. 2,020,
P- 363) : " I send, with all humility, to your Holiness the
new (moderne) lauds or litanies of the Blessed Virgin,
taken from Holy Scripture, which are sung to music on
Saturday evenings towards the Ave Maria, on vigils and
feasts of the Madonna, on principal feast days, and on
the visit of great princes to this Holy House and Church
of Lore to, in order to give your Holiness the opportunity
of introducing them on the same days in honour of
Our Lady, and having them sung in St. Peter s and
elsewhere," etc.

The matter was submitted to examination, and there
is preserved in the Vatican Library the manuscript of
an official report and votum. The anonymous con
sultant finds the Litany to be devout and edifying, but
remarks that several of the titles attributed to Our
Lady in this Litany are applied in Holy Scripture in
their literal or mystic sense rather to Christ and His
Church, though some of them have also been applied
by the Church to Our Blessed Lady. At the same time
he does not think the new Litany to be of sufficient
value to be introduced by an official act into Rome, or
extended to the Universal Church.

The Litany here referred to was clearly not our
Litany of Loreto. The expression " taken from Holy
Scripture " (cavate delta sacra scrittura) applied to the
petitions does not strictly fit those of the Litany of
Loreto, nor can it be exactly said of any of the latter
that they were originally " applied in Holy Scripture
rather to Christ and His Church." Further than this,
there are to be found in a small book of devotions,
published at Ingoldstadt in 1573, and entitled " The
saurus piarum et christianarum Institutionum," by John
Perelli, two different litanies with the following titles :

1. " Litany of the Mother of God taken from Holy

Scripture and accustomed to be sung in the
Holy House of Loreto every Saturday, and on
vigils and feasts of Our Blessed Lady."

2. " Another Litany of the Blessed Virgin Mary."

152

228 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Now, the interesting fact is that the second of these two
Litanies is identical with our present Litany of Loreto,
whilst the first is one whose invocations are all literally
taken from Holy Scripture, and is undoubtedly the very
litany sent to Rome for approval by Candiotti in 1578,
as above narrated.

From these facts follows the conclusion, which Sauren
himself finds unexpected and surprising, that up to
1578 our present Litany of Loreto was either unknown
at Loreto, or at least not used in public functions, and
of quite secondary importance. It is remarkable that
so weighty and so recent an authority as Dom Suitbert
Baeumer, O.S.B., in his invaluable " History of the
Breviary " (Freiburg, 1895), should have been led into
the error of stating that the litany sent up to Rome by
Candiotti was our present Litany.

Another important date in connection with this
subject is afforded by the famous battle of Lepanto, in
which the Turks were defeated by the Christian forces,
under Don John of Austria, in 1571. As we are told in
the lessons of the Roman Breviary (May 24), Pope St.
Pius V., in thanksgiving for this glorious victory, added
the title " Auxilium Chris tianorum " to the Litany of
Loreto, and as that Pope died in 1572 the addition must
have been made immediately after the victory. It is
somewhat remarkable that no official decree or other
document ordering this addition to the Litany is in
existence ; no mention is made of it in the Pope s Bull
on the victory, so that the statement of the Roman
Breviary is our only historical authority for the fact.
However, a small book of devotions entitled " Trattato
sopra 1 historia della S. Chiesa e Casa . . . di Loreto,"
published at Macerata in 1576, as well as the above-
mentioned Ingoldstadt Prayer-Book, contain the in
vocation " Auxilium Christianorum " inserted in their
version of our present Litany of Loreto. From this the
consequence must be drawn that as early as 1571 or
1572 our present Litany of Loreto was not only known
but officially recognised in Rome at a time, that is,

THE LITANY OF LORETO 229

when quite another litany, the Scriptural, or, as we may
conveniently call it, Candiotti s Litany, was the one
publicly sung at Loreto. Within a very few years,
however, these two litanies must have changed places,
for in 1587 the Roman Litany, identical with our present
Litany, was not only indulgenced by Sixtus V. in his
Bull " Reddituri " of July n, but also spoken of as
the Litany " which is recited in the House of Our
Blessed Lady " (quae in Domo Beatae Mariae Virginis
recitantur). And the following year Rutilio Benzoni,
Bishop of Loreto, ordered our present Litany to be
solemnly sung during a. three days synod which he held
in that city. From this date forward no other Litany
is known under the title of Loreto except the one so
familiar to us by that name. The former Scriptural
Litany of Loreto has passed into practical oblivion.
There can be little doubt that Sauren is correct in sur
mising that the cause of this substitution was the
refusal of Rome to approve the Loreto Litany sent by
Candiotti in 1578.

Herr Sauren, to whom is due the credit of these
interesting discoveries, next discusses the question of
the origin of our present Litany. Two theories may be
put forward. One theory is that both litanies had their
origin in Loreto, were both in use at that shrine, but
that the Scriptural Litany enjoyed, up to 1578, higher
esteem, and so was sung on Saturdays and feast days.
The failure of Candiotti s petition may have brought it
into disfavour.

The second, and more probable, theory holds that our
present Litany had its origin outside of Loreto, and
was brought to the Shrine from elsewhere. This view
is supported by the account of the silver tablet sent as
an offering to Loreto by Sapelli in 1489, as above
related, with our Litany engraved upon it, as well as
by the statement of Riera that this Litany was wont
to be sung by pilgrims coming to Loreto. And as
St. Pius V. added the invocation " Auxilium Christian-
orum " to a Litany which was not at that date belonging

230 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

to Loreto, though it has since become so, we may
conclude that our present Litany is really one of Roman
origin carried to Loreto by pilgrims. Since the silver
tablet of 1489 is absolutely the earliest historical datum
for the history of our Litany we have therefore no
warrant at all for fixing the date of its origin earlier than
the late fifteenth century. This is indeed a very far
cry from the statements of the numerous writers
referred to earlier on in this paper who claim that our
Litany goes back to Pope Gregory the Great, to the
earliest Christian centuries, or even to Apostolic times.*
A most interesting question now arises as to the
authorship of our Litany of Loreto. It may be at once
said that we have absolutely no information, not even a
tradition to go upon, in determining this question. A
careful study of the various invocations shows that the
author must have been not only a pious, but also a
theologically learned man. The titles given to Our
Lady are not only skilfully chosen, but are also arranged
in an accurate and consequent order. We have already
referred to a number of Litanies of our Blessed Lady
published in various works of devotion, and reprinted
in Sauren s essay. That writer points out that though
all these Litanies differ more or less widely from ours,
yet that the latter contains many epithets to be found
also in the other Litanies, and more especially that an
examination of these numbered by him 5, 7, and 8, viz.,
one published by Dulcibello in 1503, one taken from
an old missal in Gothic characters, and published by
Cosimo, and a third published at Venice in a small
prayer-book in 1561, proves that our present Litany is
nothing else than a revised version or redaction of these
three Litanies, in any case the work of a learned and

* It may be of some interest to add that our Litany of Loreto
was first printed in 1576, in the above quoted Italian treatise of
the arch-priest Bernardino Cirillo, published at Macerata ; and
that it was first set to music by Palestrina, and his contem
porary, Orlando Lasso, in the second half of the sixteenth
century.

THE LITANY OF LORETO 231

skilful editor rather than author. Who this writer may
have been it is unfortunately impossible even to surmise.
We may now summarise the net results of this his
torical investigation as follows :

1. The use of " Litanies," or the recitation of public
prayers in the form of strings or series of invocations
repeated by the people, goes back to the earliest times
of Christianity. Such litanies were at first exclusively
used in processions.

2. The earliest form of litanies is that which has come
down to us as " the Litanies of the Saints," and which
has long enjoyed liturgical rank.

3. There is reason to believe that many forms of
litanies in honour of our Blessed Lady were in use in
different parts of the Church from fairly early times
at least from the seventh or eighth century, as testified
by the old Irish Litany of the " Leabher Breac."

4. These various litanies consisted of series of
invocations of the Mother of God, under various sym
bolical and allegorical titles, taken from the Holy
Scripture or the writings of the Fathers of the Church.

5. In the latter part of the sixteenth century a
litany of the Blessed Virgin, the text of which is still
extant, was accustomed to be sung at the sanctuary of
Loreto on Saturdays and great Feast Days. Its age
is uncertain, but in all probability it was, at that time
referred to, only recent. The invocations in this litany
are taken exclusively from Holy Scripture.

6. Between 1578 and 1587, probably owing to the
refusal of the Holy See to give a solemn approbation to
this Scriptural Litany, its use was superseded at Loreto
by another litany, said to have been brought thither by
pilgrims, in which the titles of Our Lady are taken
chiefly from the Fathers and Doctors of the Church.
This litany is very probably of Roman origin. It is our
present " Litany of Loreto."

7. A comparison of it with other litanies extant shows
that it is not an original composition, but a skilful and

232 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

learned adaptation of at least three other extant litanies,
all printed and published between 1503 and 1561.

8. Its author must, therefore, have been a learned and
devout theologian, living probably in Rome, and during
the fifteenth century, possibly at its close ; his name is
entirely lost.

It will now be of some interest briefly to review the
various titles of Our Lady as contained in our present
Litany of Lore to. This subject has attracted the
attention of several pious writers who have commented
upon the Litany. Sauren justly remarks that, unlike
most of the earlier litanies of Our Lady, wherein the
different epithets applied to the Blessed Virgin are
thrown together with little or no order, our Litany
forms an organic whole, in which every title has its
proper place and sequence.

In analysing the invocations, we may properly begin
by marking off those four which have an historical
origin, and which, not belonging to the original form of
our Litany, have been subsequently added to it by
Papal authority. These are (i) " Auxilium Chris tian-
orum," which, as we have seen, according to the testi
mony of the Breviary, was added by St. Pius V. in 1571
or 1572, after the battle of Lepanto. (2) " Regina sine
labe originali concepta," added by permission of
Pius IX. after the definition of the Immaculate Concep
tion in 1854, though strictly speaking no papal docu
ment has ever officially extended the use of this invoca
tion to the Universal Church, according to a decree of
the Congregation of Rites of April 8, 1865.* (3) " Regina
Sacratissimi Rosarii," added by Leo XIII. in his decree
of December 24, 1883, ordering this petition to follow
immediately the one just mentioned. (4) "Mater Boni
Consirii," Leo XIII. , by decree April 22, 1903.

* " Meletens . . . Utrum ex pracepto adjungendum : Regina
sine labe originali concepta ? . . . Ad. iii. Negative." It will
thus be seen that up to that time the addition of that title was
not obligatory. Since the decree of Leo XIII. of December 24,
1583, we may infer that the invocation is now ex pracepto.

THE LITANY OF LORETO 233

We may now proceed to analyse the titles of the
Litany as a whole. This has been done in different
ways by different writers. Justinus Michoviensis, in
his already quoted work (vol. i., Discurs. ix., p. 23),
points out that there are three motives for which a person
merits praise and honour viz., (i) An illustrious name,
(2) virtuous and heroic deeds, (3) high rank and dignity.
He finds this order indicated in the Litany, in which we
have first the venerable name of Mary. " Sancta Maria,"
second, her virtues, whether in literal language (" Sancta
Dei genitrix " to " Virgo fidelis "), or in metaphorical
language (" Speculum justitiae " to " Stella matutina "),
and also her heroic deeds (" Salus infirmorum " to " Aux-
ilium Chris tianorum ") ; third, the concluding invoca
tions, all beginning with the title " Queen," to indicate
her supereminent rank and dignity.

The analysis of Sauren (following Knoll and Kolb) is
more elaborate. He considers the titles of our Lady as
falling into two groups those relating to her own
individual personality, and those applying to her in her
relation to the Church of Christ. We may express the
further analysis in a tabular form :

i. OUR LADY S PERSONALITY.

As Mother of God. Sancta Maria to Mater Salva-

toris.
As Virgin. Virgo prudentissima to Virgo

fidelis.

As Virgin Mother (by meta- Speculum justitise to Vas in-
phors). signe devotionis.

2. OUR LADY IN RELATION TO THE CHURCH.

Foreshadowed in the Old Rosa Mystica to Stella matu-

Testament. tina.

Her relation to the Church Salus infirmorum to Auxilium

militant and suffering. Christianorum.

Her relation to the Church Regina angelorum to the end.

triumphant.

Whatever be the value of this somewhat elaborate
analysis, it at least serves to show the symmetry and
accurate care with which our Litany has been compiled.

234 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

But even though such an analysis may bear the appear
ance of being somewhat fanciful, even a casual examina
tion of the Litany reveals a certain deliberate arrange
ment of titles, concerning which I may be permitted to
quote some words published by me a few years ago :
" An analysis of the titles by which Our Lady is ad
dressed in this Litany reveals the fact, which perhaps
is rarely adverted to, that after the three introductory
titles, if one may so call them, which in a way give the
keynote to what follows ( Sancta Maria/ Sancta Dei
genitrix, Sancta Virgo Virginum ), these titles fall
into four distinct groups viz., (i) One of the ten
invocations in which Our Lady is addressed as Mother,
and so her Divine Maternity celebrated ; (2) one in
which, under six invocations, she is styled Virgin,
thus proclaiming her Virginity ; (3) a longer group of
seventeen titles, made up of types and mystic figures,
which set her forth as the Mystic Woman, the predestined
Woman of the Old Law ; and (4) a group of invocations
to her as Queen, thus proclaiming her Triumph."*

In accordance with this four- fold division, my friend,
Mr. G. A. Oesch, formerly of St. Bede s College, Man
chester, at my suggestion composed music to the
Litany of Loreto, whose object was " to set forth these
four varieties of the titles of Our Lady by four corre
sponding variations in the music, celebrating respectively
her Divine Motherhood, her Virginity, her Mystic
Character, and her Queenship, somewhat as in the
Litany of the Saints the music varies with the change
in the form of invocation " (loc. cit.). It will be interest
ing here to quote the testimony of an eminent Anglican
authority : " With regard to the third group, the follow
ing remark of Dr. F. G. Lee, the Anglican vicar of
Lambeth, in his work, The Sinless Conception of the
Mother of God (London, 1892), may be quoted : It
is both interesting and instructive (eminently calcu
lated to rectify historical errors) to note that the titles

* Preface to " Litany of Loreto for four mixed Voices."
Composed by G. A. Oesch. Ratisbon : Pustet, 1892.

THE LITANY OF LORETO

235

and expressions by which the Mother of God is addressed
in the Litany of Loreto are almost all found in the
writings of the Fathers of the first six centuries. What
some persons have been accustomed to regard medieval
superstitions are, in truth and reality, patristic facts.
-Ibid.,p.g 5 ."

In conclusion, I may remark that, although our
Litany cannot, like its predecessor, be called Scriptural,
yet a number of the mystic titles quoted from the
Fathers are in reality borrowed, or at least adapted by,
the latter from one or other passage of Holy Scripture.

The following table, based on and abridged from
Sauren, of the titles will show this fact to demonstration :

TITLE.
Sancta Dei Genitrix.

S. Virgo Virginum.
Mater Christi.
Mater Divinae Gratiae.
Mater purissima.

Mater castissima.
Mater inviolata.

Mater intemerata.
Mater amabilis.
Mater admirablis.

Mater Creatoris.
Mater Salvatoris.
Virgo prudentissima.

Virgo veneranda.
Virgo praedicanda.

Virgo potens.

Virgo clemens.
Virgo fidelis.

WRITERS FROM WHOM TAKEN.

Cone. Eph. 431) SS. Au
gustine, Ephrem, Basil, Methodius.

Bruno the Carthusian, Petrus Cel-
lensis, Hugh of St. Victor.

SS. John Damascene, Augustine,
Gregory Nazianzen.

" M. Gratiae," Idiota ; " M. Gratia-
rum," St. Anselm.

Johannes Hondemius ; " M. mun-
dissima," St. John Damascene ;
" Domina purissima," St. Ephrem.

St. Ildephonsus.

St. Ephrem ; " Virgo inviolata," St.
Gregory Thaum.

SS. Augustine, Methodius, Jerome.

Gulielmus Parisiensis.

Simeon Metaphrastes, Albert the
Great.

SS. Bonaventure and Anselm, Caesar
Cistariensis.

Origen, SS. Epiphanius and Ilde
phonsus.

(Cf. Matt, xxv.) Idiota, St. Bonaven
ture, Albert the Great.

St. Gregory Nazianzen.

" Virgo . . . celebranda," St. John
Damascene.

(St. Bonaventure, " tu es potentis-
sima.")

Hermannus Contractus.

Abbot Rupert ; " Virgo fidelissima,"
Albert the Great.

236

SKETCHES IN HISTORY

TITLE.

Speculum justitiae.
Sedes sapientiae.

Causa nostrse laetitiae.

Vas spirituale.*
Vas honorabile.

Vas insigne devotionis.
Rosa mystica.

Turris Davidica.

Tunis eburnea.
Domus aurea.
Foederis area.

Janua Coeli.
Stella matutina.

Salus infirmorum.

Refugium peccatorum.
Consolatrix afflictorum.

Auxilium Christianorum.
Regina Angelorum.
Regina SS. omnium.

WRITERS FROM WHOM TAKEN.

" S. totius justitiae," Abbot Gueric.
SS. Anselm Bernard, and Laurence

Justinian.
"Causa nobis Isetitiae," St. Gregory

of Nicomedia " Causa unica laeti-

tiae," St. Joseph Hymnographus ;

" Causa gaudii et laetitiae," Albert

the Great.
" Vas Spiritus Sancti," Bernardinus

de Bustis, Antonius.
Vas honoratum," Ephiphanius ;

"Vas venerabile," St. Bonaven-

ture.

No exact equivalent.
Helinandus (cf. "V^isdom xxiv. 18 ;

xxxix. 17).
Abbot Philippus, Honorius of Autun,

Richard of St. Laurence (cf. Cant.

iv. 4).

Ditto (cf. Cant. vii. 4).
Isidore of Thessalonia.
Idiota, Petrus Cellensis, Richard of

St. Victor, f
St. Peter Damian.
St. Peter Damian ; also Idiota and

St. Simon Stock.
" Salus aegrotantium," Johannes

Geometra.

SS. Ephrem and Bonaventure.
Bernardinus de Bustis; "Consola
trix mcerentium," Helinandus and

Albert the Great.
St. John Damascene.
St. Josephus Hymnographus.
St Anselm.

This brief table will be readily admitted to justify
Herr Sauren s conclusion that " the Litany has a dog
matic foundation. It contains nothing inaccurate or
exaggerated, but correctly represents the doctrine of the
Church concerning the veneration of the Mother of God

* " Vas," as applied to persons in both O.T. and N.T. e.g.,
St. Paul, styled " vas electionis " by Christ Himself (Acts
ix. 15). The Italian (and French) versions paraphrase, instead of
translating literally, these three invocations : "Dimoradello Spirito
sancto vaso di elezione modello di vera pieta" (Sauren, p. 41).

t " Area," applied to Mary by some of the oldest fathers
SS. Methodius, Ephrem, Ambrose.

THE LITANY OF LORETO 237

as resting upon both Scripture and Tradition " (op. cit.,

P. 50).

It is necessary to add that Sauren s little work at
tracted very great attention at its appearance, and was
discussed by several writers, but by none so fully as by
Fr. Angelo de Santi, S.J., who subjected it to an ex
tremely severe and exhaustive criticism, and succeeded in
throwing doubt upon, if not in disproving, several state
ments made by Sauren and the authorities he followed,
especially as regards Savelli s silver plate. His pamphlet
is a work of great erudition. In its main results i.e.,
the modernity of our Litany of Loreto and the existence
of another, a Scriptural litany, for some time side by side
with the former he practically confirms Sauren s views.
The differences in the conclusions he arrives at are these :
(i) He considers our present litany to be somewhat older,
even at Loreto, than the Scriptural litany, and that it
was probably sung in public at Loreto in the first half
of the sixteenth century, or perhaps even at the end of
the fifteenth, during the Plague. (2) The Scriptural
litany was probably composed about 1575, and for a
time (say 1578 to 1587) the two litanies existed side by
side on almost equal footing, but that after this the
Scriptural litany disappeared altogether from use.
(3) The present " Loreto " litany was not introduced
from outside e.g., from Rome by pilgrims, but took
its rise at Loreto itself, and was not even known in Rome
in 1587.

Whatever we may think of these differences of view,
Sauren will have always the merit of a pioneer in this
interesting subject, and his main thesis may be safely
considered as established.

BOOKS TO BE CONSULTED.

JOSEF SAUREN, Rector am St. Marienhospital zu Koln.

" Die Lauretanische Litanei nach Ursprung, Geschichte

und Inhalt dargestellt." Kempten : Kosel, 1895.
P. ANGELO DE SANTI, S.J. : " Die Lauretanische Litanei :

Historisch-kritische Studie." Aus dem Italienischen von

Johann Norpel. Paderborn, Schoningh.

A FORGOTTEN CHAPTER OF THE SECOND
SPRING

" THE Second Spring !" To which of us is this name
not familiar ? To what English Catholic is it not the
watchword of a glorious past and the harbinger of a
still more glorious future ? It is a word which, for
over half a century, has been sweet upon our lips
ever since that July 13, 1852, when the author of the
phrase and the great leader of the movement first cried
out before the assembled fathers at Oscott, in that
most eloquent and impassioned of all his immortal
compositions : " The English Church was, and the
English Church was not, and the English Church is
once again. This is the portent, worthy of a cry. It
is the coming in of a Second Spring ; it is a restoration
in the moral world, such as that which yearly takes
place in the physical."

The story is one that has often been told, and will
often be told again, because we Catholics cannot easily
weary of its repetition. It is one which makes the
heart beat quicker with joy and gratitude at the great
things which have been done for us by " Him, who is
mighty, and blessed is His name."

It is perhaps not too much to say that in the popular
mind, and very likely in our own minds, the so-called
" Oxford Movement " is more or less identified with

238

A FORGOTTEN CHAPTER 239

that other great spiritual phenomenon just alluded to
as the Second Spring that is to say, the marvellous
revival, growth, and development of the Catholic Church
in England during the last fifty years of our century.
True it is, indeed, that the mighty stirring of the mind
and heart of religious England in its old ancestral seat
of learning has played an all-important one is almost
tempted to say a preponderating part in the life of
the Catholic Church in this country. It has given to
us our greatest leaders in Newman and in Manning ;
it has given to us many of our chief thinkers and
writers in men like Ward and Dalgairns, St. John and
Bowden, Ryder and Bellasis, Harper and Coleridge,
Allies and Lockhart, and a legion of others ; and it is
the prestige, both religious, intellectual, and social, of
their names that has so greatly elevated our position
before the English people. It is, again, the intellectual
stimulus which proceeded from this Oxford School that
has gone far to vivify the intelligence and to create the
literature of modern Catholic England. All this is
true, and my summary of the influence of the Oxford
Movement upon our Second Spring is, if anything, too
weakly expressed.

But I venture to submit, and the object of this paper
is to show, that the Oxford Movement was after all but
one chapter, however glorious a one, of a complete
history. The influence of the Oxford Movement was an
influence external to the Catholic Church, a movement
primarily in the bosom of the Anglican Establishment,
working therein with an effect at once elevating and
disintegrating, and, as its final result, bringing over to
the Catholic Church so much of what was noblest and
best of Anglican intellect and heart. But I wish to
show that the modern revival of Catholicity has not
been the exclusive outcome of this mighty influence
from outside. There are other chapters in the history
scarcely, if at all, less worthy of record. To take an
example which will occur to every mind a very

240 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

important share in the resuscitation of Catholic life
and practice, and in the multiplication of both clergy
and laity, must be attributed to the great stream of
immigration from Catholic Ireland, consequent upon
the famine and disease which in 1846, 1847, an< ^ following
years drove so many poor, yet staunch, Catholics to
these shores and spread them all over the country.

There is yet another chapter, one less known, or
more frequently forgotten, in the history of our Second
Spring, and it is the one which I have chosen as the
subject of my present paper. It is a revival of Catholic
faith and practice in the very midst of the Catholics
of this country themselves ; itself, the effect of what, to
borrow the pet phrase of a late Archbishop of Canter
bury, was in very truth literally an " Italian Mission."
And it may be doubted whether, without this internal
revival, preparing the way for other and more external
influences, even such a vital force as that of the Oxford
Movement would have been able to produce the far-
reaching effects which are attributed to it.

As in all great movements of the human mind, under
the providence of God, the history of spiritual pheno
mena affecting peoples, or even society at large, is gener
ally intimately bound up with the life-history of certain
chosen individuals. This has been true on a grand
scale in the great internal reformation of the Church
in the twelfth century, so intimately connected with
the spiritual history of a Francis and a Dominic. This
is true, if on a smaller scale, yet with no less intensity,
of the Oxford Movement, so inextricably bound up with
the intellectual and spiritual development of John
Henry Newman. And it is also true, once more, in the
history of that other chapter of the Second Spring,
with which I am concerned at present. It is for this
reason that I must begin my narrative by carrying the
reader back to one or two biographical details concerning
men whose names are no doubt much less familiar, but
scarcely less worthy of our interest.

A FORGOTTEN CHAPTER 241

11.

In the year 1797, four years before the birth of John
Henry Newman, there was born in the town of Rovereto,
in the Italian Tyrol, the last heir to an ancient and
noble family, Antonio Rosmini Serbati, of whom
Cardinal Wiseman once predicted that he would one
day be ranked with St. Augustine and St. Thomas
Aquinas among the most luminous intelligences that
this world has produced.* It is, I think, an unfortunate
circumstance that the name of this most saintly and
most gifted priest is scarcely, if at all, remembered
except in connection with certain hotly disputed
philosophical tenets and controversies, which too often
have been as acrimonious as they are abstruse. Great,
however, as was the philosophical acumen of this
remarkable man we have already seen Wiseman s
opinion of him great as has been the part played in
the schools by many of his philosophical tenets, high as
is the place which he has conquered as a thinker in the
estimation even of non-Catholic philosophers of our
time I venture to think that his place in the history
of the Catholic Church ought to be marked, not so much
by all this, as by his life, which was that of a saint,
and by his work, which was that of a founder of a
religious society. That society, so true to the spirit
of its founder and of its name, so unobtrusive and yet
so unfailing in its operations, so justly endeared to
those who know it, is the Institute of Charity. It
would be impossible here to narrate the history of this
foundation, which dates from the years 1827 and 1828.
It was a work, not of any sudden precipitation, but
rather one which seemed to have been forced upon
Rosmini by the over-ruling of Divine Providence.
The Institute, as its name indicates, is a society destined
to carry out the great work of Divine charity in the

* " Life of Antonio Rosmini Serbati." By William Lockhart.
Vol. i., p. 316. London, 1886.

16

242 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

broadest possible manner, and in every way which
Providence may open to its members. " The rules and
constitutions," says Rosmini s biographer himself the
very first fruit of the Oxford Movement " of the
Institute of Charity as they were formed by the founder
and sanctioned by the Church, have this one end in view,
to undertake nothing beyond the sanctification of our
own soul, to refuse nothing to which the voice of God s
Providence may call us, for this on receiving God s call
becomes an element in our own sanctification."* Again
Rosmini wrote : "It is necessary to reflect that the
Institute is by its nature, as it were, a connecting link
between the regular and the secular clergy ; hence it
requires, on the one part to retain all that forms the
essence of the religious state in accordance with the
Evangelical and Apostolic teaching, and on the other
part to approach to the secular clergy in what is not of
the essence of the religious state. Only in this way
can it attain its end, which is the exercise of universal
charity. By acting in this way I think it will be able
to serve God and the Church better, and to render
itself a subsidiary body, ready to serve humbly and
willingly, as well the regular clergy, with which it has in
common the profession of the Evangelical Counsels, as
the secular clergy, of which it retains the external form.
The Institute desires to be the servant of all, that it
may be found of use to all."f

True to the principles here laid down, the Institute
of Charity has never ceased to carry out, both in Italy
and beyond her borders, works of active charity of
every possible kind, at the request of and in co-opera
tion with the Bishops and clergy. Among such works
may be enumerated the giving of retreats, the preaching
of public missions, the care of parishes, the education
of youth, the training of the clergy, the direction of
orphanages and industrial schools, the cultivation of

* Lockhart, ut sup., vol. ii., p. 176.

f Lockhart, ut sup., vol. i., pp. 303, 304. >

A FORGOTTEN CHAPTER 243

Catholic literature in a word every form of religious
activity demanded by the circumstances of time and
place. And it would not be easy to over-estimate the
enormous influence in the revival of Catholic life, especi
ally in the North of Italy, which is owing to the action
of Rosmini and his Institute. It is now time to say
something of the like influence in our own country.

III.

The religious condition of England has never ceased
to be a subject of intense interest and sympathy to
great and holy souls during the past three centuries.
Who does not remember the absorbing devotion of the
great St. Paul of the Cross for prayer for the conversion
of England, which made him declare that he could
never offer up Mass without praying for it, and which
was actually one of the determining factors in the
establishment of his Congregation of the Passionists ?
And so Antonio Rosmini was similarly impressed from
the beginning with this deep interest in the religious
future of the English people. " For the restoration/*
he writes, " of this, once an island of saints, to the
bosom of the Church, I would willingly shed my blood."
And though he was never destined to take any personal
part in the great work, nor even to touch upon the
English shores, Providence so disposed events that,
next to Italy, England became the chief scene of the
labours of his children. And this leads me to introduce
another remarkable character.

On July 14, 1801, and therefore just half a year
later than Newman, was born in Rome Aloysius Gentili*
Highly gifted by nature, a born poet and an accom
plished musician, with a taste for mechanical and
electrical science, devoted to the cultivation of modern
languages his was, indeed, an attractive personality.
His early life was that of a brilliant young man of the
world, full of ambition of a nobler kind, a pet of society ,

16 2

244 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

an evident favourite of fortune. His biographer thus
describes him at the moment when he seemed to be
reaching the zenith of his success : " He was tall and
well made in person, without being corpulent, of noble
appearance and dignified bearing, his hair was shiningly
black, and his complexion fair though somewhat pale,
with blue piercing eyes ; his voice also was sonorous and
agreeable. Besides the advantage of a prepossessing
exterior, he was gifted with a retentive memory, a clear
understanding, a lively imagination, and a natural elo
quence. In addition to his accomplishments in juris
prudence, literature, and other liberal arts and sciences,
he was doctor, advocate, professor, and knight. At the
same time, he was in good pecuniary circumstances,
and in communication with a large circle of aristocratic
friends and acquaintances."*

The story of his vocation, and especially of his attrac
tion to the English Mission, is a romantic one. I have
above referred to his delight in the study of modern
languages, and among these he was especially fond of
English. He much frequented English society in Rome,
and was a well-known and welcome guest therein.
Fr. Lockhart relates how a Protestant relative of his
own, years after, on reading the name of Fr. Gentili as
a great Catholic preacher in the English newspapers,
exclaimed : " Can this be that Luigi Gentili with whom
we used to sing duets in Rome ?" One of his most
esteemed poems was an elegy on the death of a young
English lady of high family, Miss Bathurst, who, riding
with the French Ambassador along the banks of the
Tiber, was thrown by her restive horse into the river
and drowned. Gentili s constant intercourse with the
English colony in Rome was rudely ended. He formed
a romantic attachment for a young English lady of very
high rank and great fortune, and the attachment would
appear to have been mutual, but his hopes were sternly

* " Life of Aloysius Gentili." By Fr. Pagani, p. 14.
London, 1851.

A FORGOTTEN CHAPTER 245

cut short by the lady s parents, who, in order to put an
end for ever to his aspirations, immediately sent their
daughter back to England. The blow was a severe one
to a temperament like Gentili s. It finally shattered
the whole fabric of his worldly hopes and ambitions.
But, in reality, the disappointment was an act of Divine
Providence, which led him to see the vanity of all dreams
of earthly happiness. At first he was missed, but very
soon forgotten, in English society in Rome. The shock
had brought on a severe illness, and his first step on
recovery was to seek admission in the Society of Jesus.
He would have been accepted, for he was greatly
beloved by the fathers of whom he had been a pupil,
but his health seemed broken, and the Society did not
venture to receive him. All this time he was becoming
more and more impressed with the conviction that God
called him to the priesthood, and to labour for the con
version of England. And so it was. Providence once
more led him to make the acquaintance of Fr.
Rosmini, who, at his earnest entreaty, accepted him as a
postulant of the newly-founded Institute. He remained
in Rome, attending theological lectures, whilst residing
at the Irish College, in order, at the same time, to
improve his English, and after his ordination to the
priesthood in 1830, proceeded to Domodossola to make
his noviciate. Whilst Gentili was living at the Irish
College, a young English gentleman, who had been
converted whilst a student at Cambridge, arrived in
Rome. This was Mr. Ambrose Phillips de Lisle, eldest
son of the Squire of Garendon and Grace Dieu Manor
in Leicestershire. This zealous convert applied to the
rector of the Irish College to obtain for him a priest to
preach the Catholic faith in the neighbourhood of his
ancestral home. The rector, whilst offering Holy Mass,
felt inwardly moved to suggest the Abate Gentili as in
every way suited to the purpose. This led to a great
friendship between the young priest and Mr. de Lisle,
the submission of the whole project to Rosmini, and

246 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

eventually to the coming of the Father to this country
in 1835.* A word may here be said of the state of things
in England at their arrival, and I will venture to quote
a passage of Fr. Lockhart, which sketches the situa
tion better than I can pretend to do : " They came at a
very critical time in the religious history of England.
Great religious changes have taken place through means
of many providential agencies during the fifty years that
have passed since their landing. They came just six
years after the passing of the Roman Catholic Emanci
pation Act. This, in granting political freedom and
equality with their fellow-subjects to the Catholics, and
especially to Catholic Ireland, had practically swept
away all that remained on the Statute Book of the Penal
Laws against the Catholic religion. The religious
persecution had gradually died out ; it had long ceased
to be exile or death for a priest to minister in England,
Scotland, and Ireland. The fines and imprisonment for
not attending the services of the Established Church
had impoverished the Catholic nobility and gentry, and
made the practice of their religion by the poor nearly
impossible ; but these fines, after two hundred years,
had long ceased to be exacted. These changes had
resulted from the gradual working of public opinion,
and partly from Catholics having become socially in
significant. Before the passing of the Emancipation
Act Catholics were excluded by law from all political
power ; no Catholic Peer could take his seat in the
House of Lords ; no Catholic could be a member of the
House of Commons. For nearly three hundred years
the Catholics, even the upper classes, had been almost
entirely secluded from general society. They lived in
their country seats, almost unknown except to their
own tenants and to a few of their more immediate
neighbours. The penal laws had been in various ways,
of studied purpose, socially degrading. For instance,

* Not without strong opposition in some quarters in England ;
see "Life and Letters of Ambrose Phillips de Lisle, " L by Edwin
de Lisle, vol. i., pp. 105-110 (London, 1900). u

A FORGOTTEN CHAPTER 247

if a Catholic had a horse of more than 5 in value, any
Protestant could tender that sum and take the horse.

" The only Catholic places of worship in the country
were the domestic chapels attached to Catholic gentle
men s houses, except in some wild parts of Lancashire,
Yorkshire, Scotland, and a few other out-of-the-way
places, where, as in Ireland, the faith of the people in
the Old Religion had never died out. The externals of
religion, however, had been reduced to the minimum.
In towns the Catholic chapel was always an unpretend
ing building in one of the back streets. In London and
other large cities and principal towns some larger
Catholic chapels for they were never then called
churches had been built externally of the style and
appearance of Dissenting Meeting Houses, though
within exhibiting somewhat of the seemly adornment
belonging to Catholic worship.

" The non-Catholic population of England consisted
of the members of the Anglican or Established Church,
and of the Protestant Dissenters, who were very
numerous. The older sects were chiefly the Inde
pendents, Baptists, Quakers, and Unitarians. The
Established Church had never had much hold on the
masses, who would probably have remained Catholics
if there had been priests to instruct them, and during
the eighteenth century it had fallen into a state of deep
religious lethargy. Many of the higher clergy and
educated laity were rather mere Socinian Rationalists
than Orthodox Christians. About the middle of the
eighteenth century a great revival of religious earnest
ness and belief in the Christian doctrines had begun
in the Anglican Church, originated by John Wesley,
whose followers, however, withdrew from the Church of
England, where they were generally discountenanced
and opposed, and formed the large bodyjof modern
Dissenters known as Wesleyans or Methodists."*

Such was the England into which Gentili and his
companions were sent by Rosmini in 1835.

* " Life of Rosmini," vol. ii. f pp. 91-94.

248 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

IV.

It may be useful at this point to recall one or two
synchronisms between our story, as told so far, and
the movement known as the " Oxford Movement,"
which had been going on meanwhile in the bosom of
the Anglican establishment. In 1823 John Henry
Newman entered Oriel ; the same year Antonio Ros-
mini first went to Rome ; in 1827 Rosmini first received
the " Manifestation of Providence," which decided his
life-work, the foundation of his Institute ; the same year
Newman says of himself : " I was rudely awakened
from my dream by two great blows illness and
bereavement," and as Tutor of Oriel and Vicar of
St. Mary s first " came out of his shell." In 1830 the
Institute of Charity began its career at Domodossola,
and three years later (in 1833) Newman began his
" Tracts for the Times," and ever afterwards looked
upon that year as the beginning of the Tractarian
Movement.* The year of the coming of the Fathers of
Charity, 1835, occurred in the very midst of Newman s
Oxford greatness and the busy working out of his
theory of the " Via Media." At such a moment the two
providential streams of agency, the one from without,
the other from within the Church, met on English soil.

It was not merely the invitation of Mr. Phillips de
Lisle that brought the Rosminians to England. In the
meantime one of the Vicars Apostolic, Bishop Baines,
who then ruled over the Western District, having his
residence at Bath, had sought to obtain the services of
the Fathers for his College of Prior Park. Though
Rosmini gave his consent as early as 1831, the period
of preparation for the English Mission was a long one ;
for the little band did not sail from Civita Vecchia
till May 22, 1835. They set forth with a more
personal blessing and mission from the Holy See
than even St. Augustine and his companions received

* Apologia, p. 35.

A FORGOTTEN CHAPTER 249

from St. Gregory the Great, for Pope Gregory XVI.
actually came on board the vessel and blessed the three
" Italian missioners " just before they sailed probably
a unique event in missionary history !

It is worth while to quote here some of the directions
given by Fr. Rosmini to these his first foreign mis
sionaries. Thus he writes to them :

" Do everything in your power to comply with the
Bishop s desires, preferring them to charitable works of
supererogation .

;< You should behave towards the secular clergy in
such a way that there may not appear any systematic
division between you and them.

" You must be intimately persuaded that the Institute
does not seek to aggrandize itself, or to attract public
attention ; nay, rather let it be obscure, and even cease
to exist, if it can thereby contribute to the glory of God.
On which account be on your guard against mentioning
the Institute without necessity or a reasonable cause,
and endeavour to impress this characteristic spirit of
lowliness on the minds of your companions.

" I recommend you all three to conform yourselves
to the English ways in all things where there is no
wrong, putting in practice the words of St. Paul : I a.m
made all things to all men/ Do not raise objection to
anything in which there is no sin. Each nation has its
customs which are good in its own eyes. You should
conform yourselves to the customs of those people
among whom you are, which should be good in the eyes
of your charity. To be too much attached to Italian,
Roman, or French customs is no small defect in the
servant of God, whose true country is Heaven."*

Golden words, breathing the true Apostolic spirit,
and such, it is a pleasure to add, as have always been
loyally carried out in all the actions of the Institute of
Charity in our midst during the past seventy-five years
of its history.

* Pagani, pp. 136-138 ; Lockhart, vol. ii., p. 90.

250 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

We have an amusing record of Gen till s first impres
sions of London, where they arrived on June 15.

" We seemed," he writes in a letter, "to be really
entering the city of Pluto : black houses, a black sky,
black shipping, and black-looking sailors filthy to an
extreme degree. The waters of the Thames were tinged
with a colour between black and yellow, and emitted a
stench highly offensive. On land there prevailed a con
fused noise, with horses, carriages, and men of every
condition, running and crossing each other s path ; in
fine, to make a long story short, here the devil is seen
enthroned, exercising his tyrannical sway over wretched
mortals."*

No time was lost in getting to work. A few days later
Gentili preached his first sermon in England at Tre-
lawney House, in Cornwall, whither they had been
invited by Sir Henry Trelawney, Bart., a zealous
convert. He took for his text, " Thou art Peter, and
upon this rock I will build My Church," and his discourse
made a remarkable impression upon the many Protes
tants who came to hear it.

Soon after, the missionaries were settled at Prior Park,
where early in the following year (1836) Gentili gave a
retreat to the whole College ; and this was one of the
first, if not the first, public retreat according to the
method of St. Ignatius, ever given in a secular college
in England. For this reason it excited among some
good souls no little criticism and opposition as a
" novelty !" For two years Gentili was actually made
President of Prior Park ; but Bishop Baines plan of
combining secular and regular professors in his staff
was an ill-advised one, and eventually led to the only
possible result viz., the entire withdrawal of the Fathers
from Prior Park College. And this step left them free
to devote their energies and their increasing numbers
to the real work for which they came preaching the
Faith/to the English people.

* Pagani, p. 143.

A FORGOTTEN CHAPTER 251

In 1840 was opened the missionary settlement at
Grace Dieu, the seat of Mr. Phillips de Lisle, from which
as a centre they evangelized much of the surrounding
country, especially Belton, Osgathorpe, and Shepshed,*
the total population of which region was reckoned at
6,000, of whom only twenty-seven were Catholics eight
being children, three invalids, and the whole of them
poverty-stricken.

Notwithstanding these unpromising surroundings
notwithstanding the bitter hostility of the neighbouring
ministers, and Gentili s being publicly burnt in effigy
his ceaseless labours were rewarded in a space of some
two years by the reception of sixty-one adult converts,
the baptism of sixty-six children under seven, and of
twenty other children conditionally, crowned by the con
version of an Anglican clergyman, Rev. Francis Wacker-
barth. These consoling fruits were secured by really
incessant toil, daily instructions, visits, and religious
services of every kind, sometimes in inns, or hired rooms,
at others in a poor cottage, or even in the open air. The
days of Augustine and his companions had returned
amid a Saxon population.

In the meantime the numbers of the Fathers had much
grown. Among the Italians are now to be mentioned
FF. Pagani, Rinoln,f and Signini ; whilst some English
men had joined their ranks, notably the afterwards
celebrated Fr. Furlong and Fr. Hutton.

In 1841, the Fathers undertook the important Mission
of Loughborough, in Leicestershire, long their chief
centre and novitiate.

In 1842 Gentili visited Oxford. It is probable, but

* See " Life and Letters of De Lisle," vol. i., pp. no, in.

f Fr. Rinolfi became one of the chief and most famous of the
" Itinerant Missioners " after the death of Gentili. For twenty
years he was one of the most remarkable English-speaking
preachers. His command of the language was perfect ; his elo
quence, grace of gesture, power of diction, and cogency of argu
ment made him a model of preachers his zeal made him a perfect
Apostle.

252 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

not certain, that he met Newman, who by this time had
retired to Littlemore, where he was living a kind of
monastic life with a few followers. I have met with the
statement that Newman s first acquaintance with a
Catholic priest was with one of the Fathers of Charity,
whom he met on the outside of a stage-coach somewhere
about this date, but I cannot, unfortunately, find the
reference at present. At any rate, whether Gentili and
Newman met at Oxford or not, the visit had important
consequences. Gentili did meet one of Newman s chief
and best beloved followers, William Lockhart, a young
Scotch graduate. The result was that in the August of
the following year, " Mr. Lockhart, feeling it impossible
to resist his conviction that the Anglican Church had
fallen into fatal schism in separating from the Holy See,
came to visit Fr. Gentili at Loughborough, in whose
holiness and learning he had conceived great confidence
from the few hours he had spent in his company at
Oxford. After making a few days retreat under him in
the chapel-house at Loughborough, he was received into
the Catholic Church, and a little later, entered as a
postulant of the Order,"* of which, let me add, he
eventually became one of the most distinguished orna
ments. This conversion was the very first fruit of the
Oxford Movement, preceding as it did the reception of
the great leader himself by no less than two years ; and
it is pleasant to think that it was a Father of Charity, a
disciple of Rosmini, who had the great privilege of
culling this first ripe fruit of the Second Spring. In
Lockhart the two spiritual schools met for the first time,
and the favoured disciple of Newman became the
favoured disciple of Rosmini.

But this same year 1843 will be for ever memorable
in English Church history for the introduction into our
spiritual life, by the Fathers of Charity, of four great
and potent factors which have done so much to vivify
faith and piety. These four works it may come as

* Lockhart, vol. ii., p. 104.

A FORGOTTEN CHAPTER 253

a surprise to some of my readers to learn were :
(i) The preaching of popular Missions ; (2) the cere
mony of the Renewal of Baptismal Vows ; (3) the
Quarant Ore, or Forty Hours Exposition of the Blessed
Sacrament ; and (4) the devotions of the Month of May*
Looking back, it appears to us as if religious life must
have been almost torpid without these now familiar
works of devotion and charity.

The first public Mission was given at Loughborough
by FF. Gentili and Furlong, and had an extraordinary
success. Sixty-three converts were instructed and re
ceived at it.

From this time forward, the work of the Fathers takes
a new and far wider development. Great public missions
all over the country, whose stirring effects recall the days
of SS. Francis and Dominic, alternate with innumerable
spiritual retreats to colleges and communities for the
next five years. It would be quite impossible to narrate
in detail the events of those wonderful five years. It
was a stirring up of the mind and heart of the Catholics
of England, and a gathering into the net of converts
from Protestantism, on a scale which astonishes us as we
read of it at this distance of half a century. There is
a sameness about these never-ending missions and
retreats which will dispense me from doing more than
give a mere catalogue, year by year, of the principal
ones among them, so that some idea may be gained,
however imperfect, of the marvellous " outpouring of
Divine grace " that was going on throughout the land
during these few years in the very midst of which
period, by the way, John Henry Newman was received
into the Catholic Church (October 9, 1845) by the holy
Italian Passionist, Fr. Dominic. This same year FF.
Gentili and Furlong were, at the request of several
Bishops, formally set apart, like Paul and Barnabas,
as " Itinerant Missionaries," to be exclusively employed

* A minor innovation, also owing to the Fathers, was the use
of the Roman Collar by the clergy.

254 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

in travelling from place to place, and preaching the
Word of God, after the manner of such missionaries
in Italy. They were thus the very first Evangelical
labourers, whether native or foreign, ever officially
deputed to this high office in England since she lost the
faith.*

Some idea may be given of their labours and zeal from
what has been recorded of various great public missions.
They usually gave four or five discourses daily at fixed
intervals, taking the sermons alternately, treating both
dogmatic and moral Gospel doctrines, especially the
Great Truths the Mystery of the Redemption, the
Divine Precepts, the Life of our Lord. And the whole
of the time intervening between the discourses was
devoted to the arduous work of the confessional. So
great usually was the concourse of penitents that the
Fathers were kept occupied for eight or ten hours a day.
Sometimes they even remained in church all night long
hearing confessions, and had absolutely no time either
to say Mass or recite the Divine office, much less take any
sleep or any nourishment, except in a hasty manner.
Such wearisome labours were not interrupted, but only
varied, for weeks and even months together. They had
to prepare children for their First Communion, instruct
converts, restore peace in families, see to the restoration
of ill-gotten goods. They also introduced processions,
evening benedictions, and other solemn functions at the
close of missions, f Fr. Gentili himself, in one of his
letters, gives a picture of the scene in certain churches
during these missions. He tells us how the secular clergy
often organized a sort of " clerical guard," to prevent
the too great pressure of the crowd ; "for it has often
happened to see the church so crammed with people as
to make it difficult to effect an entrance. Of those who

* Pagani, p. 217.

f These multifarious labours are all the more astonishing when
we reflect that Fr. Gentili always abstained from the use of both
flesh-meat and wine.

A FORGOTTEN CHAPTER 255

succeeded, some were kept standing or seated for several
hours of the day or night, without being able to move,
while waiting their turn to confess. On the day of
general Communion, for which preparation was made by
appropriate meditation and hymns, the number that
presented themselves at the Eucharistic table was so
great that it was puzzling to guess from whence they all
came."*

V.

I will now give the chronological catalogue I have
spoken of above, omitting the missions at less known
or unimportant towns :

1844. Mission at Coventry, at which took place the
first public procession with a statue of Our Lady that
occurred in England for 300 years. This caused a great
sensation ; it was specially arranged by way of protest
against the " Lady Godiva " procession, which at that
time seems to have been carried out in a highly indelicate,
if not indecent, manner.

Same year, missions at Whitwick, Liverpool, Banbury,
Grantham ; retreat for students at Ushaw College.

1845. Retreat at Old Hall College, Ware. Missions
at Hull, Leeds, Sheffield, Leamington, Newport, Hud-
dersfield, Bradford, Coventry ; clergy and other retreats
at Ware, Oscott, Ushaw, Liverpool. First appearance
in Manchester and Dublin (charity sermons). More
public missions at Leicester, Worksop, Birmingham,
York, Malton, Scarborough, Whitby, Egton Bridge,
Newcastle, at which latter place no less than 250 adult
Protestants were received into the Church.

1846. Missions at Sunderland, Durham, Middles
brough, St. Augustine s (Manchester), Newport, Notting
ham, Egton Bridge, London, Dublin, St. Wilfrid s and
St. Patrick s (Manchester), Seel Street (Liverpool),
London again. Of the Manchester missions I shall give

* Pagani, p. 221.

256 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

some details just now. Meanwhile, I am glad to quote
a few reminiscences of the Seel Street mission, Liverpool,
from a correspondent,* who wrote under date October 17,
1894:

" I cannot give you many particulars, but the mission
created a great sensation at the time. Gentili was a
spare, mortified-looking man ; he spoke broken English,
rather difficult to understand till you got accustomed to
it. The style of preaching was novel and very impres
sive. At times there was some humour in it, especially
when he spoke of dishonest dealings by tradespeople and
various forms of cheating, or pointed to the ladies grand
bonnets as the outcome of some of this dishonesty. The
mission was very popular. Even at five o clock morning
service I have seen the church crammed, whilst in the
evening the people were actually standing on the broad
window-ledges inside the church. I remember, too, we
had to fast rigorously for three days, and so much im
pressed was I by the mission that I really did fast in
the strictest sense, taking but one meal a day, and made
my brother do likewise. At the end of the three days
we were both famished, and glad even of a crust of dry
bread/

I quote this letter, the writer of which was a young
man of about twenty- three at the time, to give some
idea of the enormous enthusiasm aroused by Gentili and
his co-workers at this period.

1847. Missions at Cheadle (Staffs.), North Shields,
Stockton, Hartlepool, London, Darlington, Preston
(where eighty- two Protestants were converted). Another
retreat at Ushaw College. Missions in Dublin, St.
Chad s, Manchester (sixty-one Protestants converted),
Bristol, Huddersfield.

1848. Mission at Bristol and Bath, the number of
Protestants converted at the two being over a hundred ;
in Dublin, where, in spite of the political excitement of
that year, the confessionals were so crowded that the

* My father the late Mr. J. Casartelli.

A FORGOTTEN CHAPTER 257

Fathers often sat there without a break from the last
instruction at night till the Mass on the following
morning. But a sad and altogether unexpected blow
brought to a sudden end the labours of this great
mission. Fr. Gentili, the pioneer missioner, was sud
denly seized with a fatal fever, and after only a few
days illness passed to his reward on September 26,
1848, amid the lamentations of the whole of that great
Catholic city. His mortal remains still repose in
Glasnevin Cemetery.

So ended a saintly and brilliant career, one that has
left its mark deeply upon the religious life of this country,
one to which we all owe much more than we are prob
ably aware of. I cannot leave him without quoting
just a few sentences from the splendid panegyric which
appeared in the Tablet of that time from the pen of
Lucas himself. They will give some idea of the impres
sion created by his work upon the most intelligent
observers of the time.

The life of Dr. Gentili, with his brethren, marks an
era in the history of this corner of the Church. . . .
We think of twelve hundred years ago, when another
idolatry profaned this island ; when the faith of Christ
was not known here ; when the spiritual empire of
St. Peter included not this island in its embrace. . . .
and when from a distant shore Augustine and his
companions, being as it is reported nearly forty men,
hallowed the Isle of Thanet with their footprints, and
planted the Christian mysteries among a barbarous and
untaught people. What then took place among us is
now beginning to be repeated. . . . The fulness of
time has come upon us, and God once more sends us the
heralds of His faith from the same land, across the same
mountains, from the same city, from the same See, from
a Pope bearing the name and swelling with the thoughts
of him who twelve hundred years ago laid the first stones
of the English Apostolate."

Further on Lucas speaks of the manner and method

17

258 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

of these new Italian missioners as being addressed to the
people in the literal sense of the term :

" From the beginning the members of his Order have
spoken to the people ; have endeavoured above all things
to reach the heart of the masses ; consciously or uncon
sciously have spoken to the sympathies of the poor,
not as absolving them from the law and necessary
restraint, but as raising them up to the dignity of law,
and freeing them from all other fear." Elsewhere he
speaks of Gentili as possessing " an influence such as we
remember to have been enjoyed by no preacher in this
country, in our time, or as far back as our inquiries
extend."

If this language seems exaggerated to us at the present
day, we must remember that for many years we have
been accustomed by constant experience to great
missions preached by Redemptorists, Passionists, Fran
ciscans, Dominicans, Jesuits, members of all religious
orders, and of the secular clergy ; so that they do not
now appear very extraordinary events. The month of
May, frequent Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament,
the Quarant Ore, have actually passed into our tradi
tions, and we can scarcely imagine a time when they
were not ordinary phenomena of our religious life. It
was far different in the early forties : the Fathers of
Charity were real pioneers in all these works, and the
very novelty of them explains much of the enthusiasm
they awakened, and of the profound impression they
created in both the Catholic and the Protestant public.

With the death of Gentili I must close this chapter
of history. Not that the work of his Institute was at
an end. By no means. The work of the itinerant
missions was taken up by others, and carried on for
years. Chief among these ought to be mentioned his
inseparable companion already often referred to
Fr. Furlong, of whom a few additional words must
in justice be said here. Fr. Furlong was born of
Irish parents in 1809, and was baptized by the name of

A FORGOTTEN CHAPTER 259

Moses.* From his very childhood he was remarkable
for a spirit of piety and prayer. At the age of fifteen
he was sent to the Benedictine College of Ampleforth,
where his excellent progress in study was surpassed
only by that which he made in piety and the love of
God. After spending some seven years at Ampleforth,
he accompanied Bishop Baines to his newly- established
college at Prior Park, where he was in due time ordained
priest. Shortly after his ordination he was appointed
president of St. Peter s College, and it was during his
presidentship that he formed an intimacy with the
Fathers of Charity which ultimately led him to join the
Institute, as has been already stated.

As a religious Fr. Furlong was conspicuous for his
spirit of humility, obedience, and self-sacrifice virtues
which, joined to the great natural gifts of a commanding
presence, a clear, musical, and sonorous voice, and a
captivating eloquence, eminently qualified him for the
office of itinerant missioner, and he was held in such high
esteem by the venerated founder of the Institute that,
a little before he went to his reward, he wished that
Fr. Furlong should be summoned to Italy in order to
take an active part in the election of his successor.

One of his brothers in religion, Fr. Caccia, thus wrote
of him : " After the death of Fr. Gentili in 1848, Fr.
Furlong remained at the head of the itinerant mis-
sioners, and was assisted by other fathers of the
Institute. He had not the depth of learning that
Fr. Gentili had, but the good nature that shone in his
countenance, the ardent charity that burned within him,
his nationality, common with that of his auditory, had
a great influence in Ireland, which was especially the
scene of these triumphs of evangelical charity. His
gestures, so majestic and spontaneous and yet so natural,
the perfect harmony of his voice at all times, whether

* His father wished him to be christened " Mogue," after the
patron saint of Wexford, but the priest not understanding, or
not recognising the name, called him " Moses."

17-2

260 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

raised to terrify or lowered to entreat, were so many
gifts which were irresistible. Young barristers who
were preparing for public law cases at the Assizes,
Members of Parliament and of the theatrical profession,
flocked to hear and see him, many of whom were drawn
to follow the truth which they at first despised, but
which the preacher convinced them of by his powerful
and captivating eloquence."

Worn out with his great and wonderful labours this
zealous missioner and holy religious was called to his
reward October 29, 1871. The two last years of his
life were passed in retirement at Rugby and Ratcliffe,
and he died at the latter house a calm and peaceful
death.

Other works that had been begun during Gentili s
lifetime by his colleagues still went on, and developed.
The Fathers opened permanent missions, and under
took parochial work in several towns, particularly in
Rugby, Cardiff, and London. They opened Ratcliffe
College, near Leicester, as early as 1846, and it is still
flourishing. The Reformatory School at Market
Weighton, Yorkshire, and the Industrial Schools at
Upton and Clonmel, in Ireland, are other evidences of
their zeal and success. Lastly, they established the
admirable printing press of St. William s at the Market
Weighton Reformatory, which for the excellency and
the beauty of the work it produces is almost unrivalled
in the kingdom. It is this press which prints most of
the publications of the Catholic Truth Society, and
it is not by thousands, but by millions, that it reckons
its annual output of the pamphlets and leaflets so
familiar to us all, and which are doing such incal
culable good for religion wherever the English tongue
is spoken.

A FORGOTTEN CHAPTER 261

VI.

I cannot, however, conclude this already too lengthy
paper without recurring for a moment to the missions
of the Fathers of Charity in the city of Manchester in
1845 and 1846. I shall therefore make no apology for
transcribing from Pagani s "Life of Father Gentili"
those pages which describe these wonderful Manchester
Missions, and I believe the information will come as a
surprise to many of the local Catholics of the present
day. Fr. Pagani writes :

" During the three missions given this year in Man
chester there occurred certain events which we think
not unworthy of record. With the usual solemnity, on
February 15 the mission was first opened in the church
of St. Augustine.

The sermons of the missionaries were well attended,
the number of applicants for the Sacrament of Penance
increased to such a degree that fifteen confessors,
assiduously engaged, scarcely sufficed for the demand.
One hundred and twenty-seven Protestants abjured
their errors, nearly 9,000 persons communicated, and
such was the pious zeal displayed for adorning the
altar of the Blessed Sacrament that more than 3,000
wax candles were, for this purpose, offered to the
Church.

" The next mission, towards the end of September,
was preached at St. Wilfrid s. From the commence
ment the number of people assembled to hear the Word
of God was so great that the missionary was occasionally
induced to transfer the pulpit from the church to the
public square in order to address a crowd of more than
6,000 persons. The penitents were so numerous that
some waited for days in the church until their turn came
to enter the confessionals, and seeming, like the
Biblical multitude in the wilderness, not to heed the
wants of nature. This inconvenience occurred, not-

262 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

withstanding that several confessors were engaged from
six or seven in the morning till twelve at night, if we
except the intervals necessary for their refreshment. It
even happened that one of the missionaries, on leaving
the pulpit in the evening, went direct to his confessional
where he remained all night unceasingly occupied till
five o clock in the morning, when he was again called
to the plupit to address, as usual, a meditation to the
assembly. When Fr. Gentili made his concluding
discourse the vast audience was so moved to com
punction that the preacher s voice was almost unheard
amid the sobs and sighs of the pious multitude. Im
mediately after the mission at St. Wilfrid s a similar
course of instructions was commenced at St. Patrick s
Church, situate in the most populous Catholic parish
of Manchester. Fr. Gentili, however, found this the
most difficult mission he ever had to conduct in his
life.

" The memorable mission of St. Patrick s, which began
on September 27, was not concluded before Novem
ber 12, having lasted nearly seven weeks. To the
missionaries it proved a task replete with difficulties and
trials ; but they were, however, consoled by the happy
results of their labours." The number of Protestants
received into the Church at this mission was 190, which,
adding the 61 received the following year at St. Chad s,
makes a total of 398 converts for the three churches of
St. Wilfrid, St. Patrick, and St. Chad.

What more than anything else shows the wonder
ful success which Fr. Gentili and his companions
obtained in the mission which they preached at Man
chester, and especially at St. Patrick s, is the following
memorial which the clergy of Manchester and Salford
presented in a body to Fr. Gentili as a public testi
mony of their respect and gratitude to him and to his
fellow labourers.

A FORGOTTEN CHAPTER 263

A MEMORIAL

PRESENTED BY THE CLERGY OF MANCHESTER AND SALFORD
TO

THE VERY REV. DR. GENTILI,

ON OCCASION OF HIS CONCLUDING THE MISSION GIVEN BY HIM AT
ST. PATRICK S, NOVEMBER 12, 1846.

" VERY REV. FATHER,

" Sensible of the great benefits which have
resulted from the missions which you have given in
Manchester and other important towns, we cannot surfer
you to go from amongst us without endeavouring to
acknowledge the favour which you have conferred
upon us in devoting so much of your time to the
spiritual welfare of the souls committed to our charge.
In their names and our own we beg leave to thank you
most cordially. The immense multitude of degenerate
Catholics who have been reclaimed, and the still more
remarkable number of converts which have been
received into the Church during the exercises which
you have conducted, convince us that the hand of God
is with you, and that the practice of giving missions,
which you have recently introduced into this country, is
one of the greatest blessings which has accrued to
religion in modern times.

" When we reflect on the profound learning, the
practical skill, the prompt decision, and the invincible
courage with which you have encountered and over
come the peculiar difficulties which surrounded the
mission of St. Patrick, we feel that a still more ample
tribute of admiration and gratitude is due for your
charitable and most disinterested exertions.

264 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

" We are aware, Rev. Sir, that these difficulties were
of no ordinary magnitude, and that consequently a
more than ordinary call upon your zeal and charity has
been required to overcome them. We know how for-
bearingly you watched the storm of rebellious opposition
with which you were threatened by a party of undutiful
children of the Church on the very eve of your
departure from St. Wilfrid s, where the seed of the
Word of God had happily fructified and brought forth
an abundant harvest. We know how, notwithstanding,
you repaired to St. Patrick s, and there began the work
of peace and reconciliation.

" Though the people are still suffering from the
effects of their own folly, yet, we hope, by the judicious
counsels which you, Rev. Sir, have suggested, we may
be able to complete the work of reconciliation which
you have so happily begun, ind that in a short time
they may all return to the one lold from which they have
strayed. Allow us, then, once more to express our
grateful sense which we entertain for the services
which you have rendered to religion, nor must we
forget the brother and companion of your labours,
the Rev. Fr. Furlong, who, by his powerful sermons
in the various churches of Manchester and Salford
and by his prudent, charitable, and patient zeal in the
sacred tribunal has entitled himself to the gratitude
of many, and to the love and esteem of all. May God,
who ever watches over His Church, and who from
time to time raises up light amidst darkness, still bless
your united labours with abundant success. May He
bestow upon you long life, that you may continue to
labour for His glory, for the propagation of the Faith,
the salvation of souls, and for the perfection of that
crown of glory which we feel persuaded is laid up for
you in His heavenly kingdom.

" In conclusion, reverend Father, we hope that your
absence from us will not be long, and that amidst the
fields of labour that lie before you, you will occasionally

A FORGOTTEN CHAPTER 265

remember us, and pray that we may be strengthened
and enabled to water, and to bring to perfection, the
precious seed which you have sown.

" Signed,

" W. TURNER, )

"JOHN RIMMER, VSt. Augustine s.

" THOMAS UNSWORTH, J

" ROBERT CROSKELL, ^

" GEO. GREEN, VSt. Chad s.

" W. J. SHEEHAN. j

" MATTHIAS FORMBY, |~ Marv s

"THOMAS SMITH, | St. Marys.

"R. B. ROSKELL, \

"EDMUND CANTWELL, >St. Patrick s.

" EDWARD UNSWORTH, J

"J. F. WHITTAKER, > g Wilfrid s.

JOSEPH MEANEY, J
" JAMES BOARDMAN, St. John s."

It is interesting to note that of these fourteen
signatures, representing as they do the entire Marf-
chester and Salford clergy of sixty years ago, the first
(William Turner) became, at the restoration of the
hierarchy in 1851, first Bishop of Salford; another
(Richard Roskell) became first Provost of Salford, and
afterwards, in 1853, second Bishop of Nottingham ;
John Rimmer, William Sheehan, Matthias Formby,
Edmund Cantwell, and James Boardman all became
eventually Canons of the Salford Chapter, whilst Robert
Croskell, for very many years Provost of the Salford
Chapter, survived till the close of 1892.

I am privileged to add here a letter from the Vener
able Provost, giving some interesting personal reminis
cences of those famous Manchester missions :

" ST. MARY S, LEVENSHULME,
" November 12, 1894.

" In answer to your note received this morning, I
hasten to set down the little that I remember of the

266 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

missionary labours of the Very Rev. Fr. Gentili in
Manchester.

" The mission of Fr. Gentili was a revival and
extension of the annual courses of instruction given by
the Rev. Rowland Broomhead. The homely courses
of instruction given for many successive years by the
Father of the Mission in Manchester were attended
with great fruit, and many exemplary and persevering
converts to our holy religion were living when I came
from college to St. Augustine s, Manchester, in the
year 1835.

" Fr. Gentili was accompanied to Manchester by
Fr. Furlong, who accompanied his leader regularly
for some years and until his lamented death in Dublin
in the full career of his missionary success. I cannot
remember the exact date of the first mission given by
Dr. Gentili at St. Augustine s, Manchester. Being the
first mission given in that town, the excitement was
great and the attendance overwhelming. The Doctor s
discourses were reasoning and argumentative, and were
greatly appreciated by the educated portion of the
congregation. But it was not only the intellectual
character of his sermons, but his very appearance was a
striking sermon.

" A Reverend friend of mine observed to me that
when he looked at Dr. Gentili on his presenting himself
on the missionary platform, it struck him that he was
one who had just come from the immediate presence
of God to communicate a heavenly message to the
faithful on earth. This view of the able missionary s
appearance is confirmed by a circumstance that hap
pened in the course of his first great mission in
Manchester. The Doctor had appointed a Sunday
afternoon for the Italians residing in Manchester to
assemble in St. Augustine s Church that he might
address them in their own language. The Italians
came in good numbers, but with them a considerable
number of English and Irish Catholics, and it was

A FORGOTTEN CHAPTER 267

noticed that in certain portions of the Doctor s Italian
address numbers of the people who did not understand
a word of Italian manifested signs of the deepest
emotion, which could be accounted for only by his
heavenly appearance, the tones of his voice, and his
impressive action.

"As an illustration of the fine thread of argument
which the holy missioner pursued, he could not bear
any external sounds while he was preaching. When
giving a mission at St. Chad s, then recently opened,
the masons were engaged in hewing stone in the yard
contiguous to the church for the outward wall of the
church ground, when the Doctor requested that their
work should be discontinued until he had finished his
discourse.

" The Doctor and his faithful companion and friend,
Fr. Furlong, gave a great and protracted mission at
St. Patrick s at the time that the congregation were
excited to open rebellion, on account of the removal
of Fr. Hearn, against the Bishop, the Right Rev.
Dr. Brown, his vicar, and the clergy of Manchester.
The holy missionary set himself to work to stem the
torrent of violent opposition to authority by powerful
preaching, and to give point and efficacy to his sermons ;
he imitated St. Charles Borromeo by putting on the garb
of penance and humiliation to atone for the sins of the
people. His zealous efforts produced a salutary effect
on many who were reconciled to the Church, and
returned in humility and sorrow to the practice of their
religious duties.

" The learned, zealous, and most useful career of
this saintly missionary was brought to a close in Dublin,
to the great sorrow of thousands who held him in the
greatest veneration, and his remains were honourably
interred in Glasnevin Cemetery, near those of the
great patriot, Daniel O Connell.

" We may confidently trust that he has long since
been crowned with unfading glory in heaven, and that

268 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

his life and example will shed a salubrious influence
both in England and Ireland for generations to come.
" Yours faithfully and affectionately in Christ,
" R. PROVOST CROSKELL."

My task is ended. I have tried to show that the
Second Spring of the Catholic Church in England,
of which we are at this day both the fruits and the
witnesses, was the outcome, under God s Providence,
not only of the great external influence, spiritual and
intellectual, which radiated from Oxford, and is inse
parably connected with the name and life-history of
John Henry Newman, but also of a mighty internal
operation of a spiritual and intellectual leaven, coming
direct from Rome herself, and identified with the life
and work of Aloysius Gentili and his brethren of the
Institute of Charity.

May their name and fame long be held in affectionate
veneration by the Catholics of England !

XI
THE MAKERS OF THE DUBLIN

" IF the history of the Dublin Review could be written
in full, we suspect it would be as interesting as the
narrative of an eventful human life."

So wrote some years ago the genial and gifted editor
of the Irish Monthly, Fr. Matthew Russell, S.J.*

" If the secret history of the Dublin Review were
known to the public, how strange it would appear !
So often on the point of sinking, yet always rescued,
it looks as if Heaven regarded it propitiously."

So wrote over sixty years ago Bishop (afterwards
Cardinal) Wiseman, in a letter to Dr. Charles Russell,
dated from Oscott, November 9, 1844.!

Fr. Russell, S.J., above referred to, the nephew of
Dr. Charles Russell, who, with Cardinal Wiseman and
Daniel O Connell, ranks as one of the " Makers of the
Dublin," published during the years 1893-1895 a series
of exceedingly interesting bibliographical articles on the
history of our Review in the pages of his own excellent
periodical. J These papers, based upon the invaluable
MS. documents of his late uncle, threw a flood of light
upon the early history of this Review, and especially
upon the identification of a large number of writers,
of whom he has been able to compile a list, in parts
very complete, derived chiefly from the private memor
anda of Mr. Bagshawe, the early editor, and of Mr.

* Irish Monthly, vol. xxxiii., p. 54, January, 1895.
f Ibid, i p. 56. J Irish Monthly, vols. xxi., xxii., xxiii.

269

270 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Cashel Hoey, sub-editor under Dr. Ward. These
interesting and entertaining papers of Fr. Russell
are indispensable for anybody wishing to undertake
the bibliographical history of our Review. He most
kindly allowed his own papers in the Irish Monthly to
be laid fully under contribution for the compilation of
the present article, and, moreover, generously placed
at our disposal the MSS. of Cardinal Wiseman and
others above referred to.

We have above mentioned the MS. material which
the editor of the Irish Monthly had at his disposal. The
first was a memorandum of Mr. Bagshawe, the early
editor, concerning which Fr. Russell writes :

" Through the great kindness of Mrs. Cashel Hoey
herself so distinguished a writer in fiction and in graver
departments of literature the precious little note-book
has been placed at last in my hands. It is labelled
Dublin Review, I to 104, but, unfortunately, there
are gaps in the record. Of the two quarterly parts
which form a volume of the Review the first has its
writers chronicled on the left-hand page, and the second
on the page opposite. Except in one instance towards
the end, the articles are specified only by their number,
not by subjects."*

For the second series there were available, as we have
said, certain memoranda of Mr. Cashel Hoey, the sub
editor. Fr. Russell continues :

" With No. 104 comes to an end the first official
record of contributors which Mr. Cashel Hoey inherited
from Mr. Bagshawe. As he preserved it carefully and
valued it highly, it seems strange that he did not keep
a similar record during the many years that he occupied
a position similar to Mr. Bagshawe s in the conduct of
the Review. Mrs. Cashel Hoey has been kind enough
to show the same memorandum books, in which Dr.
Ward s most efficient lieutenant took notes concerning
the authorship of certain numbers, but apparently with
* Irish Monthly, vol. xxi., p. 80.

THE MAKERS OF " THE DUBLIN" 271

a view to the carrying out of the principle, * The labourer
is worthy of his hire. "*

That is to say, these memoranda (very imperfect for
the rest) appear to name only, or at least chiefly, those
contributors to whom honoraria had been paid for their
articles, so that gaps are of frequent occurrence in
the lists. Notwithstanding their incompleteness, Fr.
Russell estimates these editorial records as a " treasure-
trove," and their discovery as his " greatest piece of
luck " in the department of literary history. Many of
the deficiencies he was able to make up from other
sources : partly from Fr. Russell s own MSS., con
sisting, as above remarked, of valuable letters and
memoranda, and partly from works since published, in
which the contributions of numerous writers to the
Review such as Cardinal Wiseman, Dr. Ward, Mr.
Abraham, Mr. Wilberforce, Bishop Grant, Cardinal
Manning, and others have been publicly acknowledged.

In a subsequent letter to the Tablet Fr. Russell
added the remark : " There are several gaps in the
catalogue, which may perhaps be supplied from other
sources. For instance, I believe the set of the Dublin
Review in Oscott College has the writers marked."
This was a hint too important to be lost, and the
present writer was enabled, through the great kindness
of Mgr. Henry Parkinson, D.D., the librarian (now
Rector) of Oscott College, to carefully examine the
set in the splendid Oscott Library and collate it with
the Irish Monthly lists. The result is somewhat curious.
To a considerable extent the two authorities coincide.
But, unfortunately, they agree also in their lacuna.
The Oscott volumes, at least in the earlier series, have
the names of authors entered in a neat, small handwriting
in the table of contents of each. So far, however, from
being complete, there are no less than seven quarterly
partsf in which the authors names, though given in

* Irish Monthly, vol. xxi., p. 146.

f Viz., vols. xii., No. 24 ; xxv., No. 50 ; xxvi., No. 51; xxvii.,
No. 52 ; xxix., No. 58 ; xlii., No. 83 ; xlvi., No. 91.

272 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Mr. Bagshawe s list in the Irish Monthly, are entirely
absent in the Oscott volumes. Occasionally one or
more articles left anonymous in the Irish Monthly are
marked in the Oscott one ; rarely vice versd. More fre
quently there is a discrepancy between the two lists,
and in most of these cases Fr. Russell, to whom
these differences have been submitted, is inclined to
consider the Oscott list the more accurate. But in
spite of this, it is sufficiently clear that the two lists
are practically identical. When the Irish Monthly list
is silent, there the Oscott list fails us too ; the volumes
indexed at Oscott, with the slight exceptions recorded,
just coincide with those indexed in the Irish Monthly
lists. So that it is evident, either that one of those
lists has been copied from the other, or that both are
derived from some common original. Whichever be
the case, it is to be feared that, unless some other MS.
sources exist which have hitherto escaped our notice,
data are no longer forthcoming for completing the list
of authors of the original series of the Review. With
the exception of a few odd articles, forty-one volumes
alone of the original series have had the names of the
reviewers preserved more or less completely. These
names will be found appended in brackets to the table
of contents of that series published in the " Jubilee "
number of the Dublin (April, 1896), the information being
derived from the several sources above enumerated.
No doubt further research may tend to correct and
complete this catalogue.

It had been our intention to treat in a similar manner
the contents of the second, or " Ward " series. For
this purpose, however, we have been able to obtain but
very scanty and unsatisfactory data. Moreover, it has
occurred to us that, for other reasons, it might be
undesirable to unveil the anonymity of the reviewers
of this series. The first series concluded early in 1863.
A generation has passed since then, and for the most
part the " Old Dublin Reviewers " themselves belong to
history. Of the writers of the second series, on the other

THE MAKERS OF " THE DUBLIN " 273

hand, many are still with us ; and literary etiquette
might in some cases make it undesirable to publish their
names, at least without their own desire. With the
opening of the third series the reign of the old-fashioned
anonymity came to an end, and subsequently nearly
all the articles have, in more modern fashion, boldly
borne their authors signatures.

After these preliminary remarks of a bibliographical
nature, we may now turn to consider more strictly the
history of the Review itself. In so doing, however, we
shall be obliged to disappoint the reader who may
expect what Cardinal Wiseman called " the secret
history " of the Review. Our object is of a much less
ambitious nature, and is limited to a brief sketch of what
may more properly be styled " the external history " of
the " historic Dublin," as it has been so justly called.

The honour of the first inception of the Dublin Review
is generally attributed, as we have said, to Dr. Wiseman
and Daniel O Connell. Dr. Nicholas Wiseman, at that
time (1836) a young man of thirty-four, and rector of
the English College in Rome, was just emerging to fame
in this country by his literary and scientific attainments.
During the preceding year he had read before a select
audience in the apartments of Cardinal Weld in Rome
his " Lectures on the Connection between Science and
Revealed Religion." O Connell was in the midst of
the most exciting period of his stirring career. Strange
to say, however, Cardinal Wiseman, in the preface to
his " Essays on Various Subjects " (1853), assigns the
honour to a third person, the first editor, Mr. Michael J.
Quin, writing : " It was in 1836 that the idea of commenc
ing a Catholic quarterly was first conceived by the late
learned and excellent Mr. Quin, who applied to the illus
trious O Connell and myself to join in the undertaking."

The first quarterly part of this most important
venture, " the Catholic rival to the Whig Edinburgh

18

274 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Review and the Tory Quarterly," duly appeared with
the date May, 1836, and has continued ever since, in
spite of all dangers and difficulties, in unbroken quarterly
succession up to the present time. It is curious to
remark that for a good many years the appearance of
the parts was by no means as regular as we should have
expected. The actual month of issue was more or less
unsettled ; in fact, strange as it may appear, during the
first dozen years of its existence there is not a single
month of the year whose name does not figure on at
least one or two of the quarterly issues.* Complete
regularity in this matter does not seem to have been
attempted until the opening of the Second Series.

The subsequent history of the Review falls into four
periods : The first is that of the original series, which
may be fairly styled the " Wiseman-Russell series,"
from the two eminent litterateurs to whom the lion s
share of the work and the chief credit of the high literary
excellence are undoubtedly due. This series, as already
stated, lasted from May, 1836, to April, 1863, filling
fifty-two consecutive half-yearly volumes. The " New
Series " which followed, from July, 1863, to October,
1878 occupying thirty-one half-yearly volumes, and
appearing at the regular quarterly intervals, and in the
months (January, April, July, and October) which have
now become stereotyped was pre-eminently the " Ward
Series," during which the remarkable personality of
that able and trenchant philosopher, Dr. W. G. Ward,
who combined in himself the functions of both pro
prietor and editor, completely predominates the life-
history of the Review, and gives to this series an indi
vidual cachet all its own.

The retirement of Dr. Ward, and the passing of the pro
prietorship into the hands of Bishop (afterwards Cardinal)

* To quote a few examples : January, 1838, 1839, 1847 ;
February, 1840-43 ; March, 1844-46 ; April, 1837, 1838 ; May,
1836-39, 1840-43 ; June, 1844-46 ; July, 1836-38 ; August,
1839-43; September, 1844-46; October, 1837,1838; November,
1839-42 ; December, 1836, 1843-45.

THE MAKERS OF " THE DUBLIN " 275

Vaughan, and of the editorship into those of the learned
Bishop of Newport, Dr. Hedley, mark the opening of
the " Third Series," on comparatively novel lines. This
series embraced twenty-six half-yearly volumes, lasting
from January, 1879, to October, 1891. With the passing
of the editorship into the hands of Mgr. Canon James
Moyes, the " Fourth Series," began with the January
number of 1892, and has occupied twenty-eight half-
yearly volumes. Finally, with the January of 1906,
the Dublin once more begins what may be called a
younger "Ward Series," under the editorship of the
well-known and talented writer, Mr. Wilfred Ward, son
of the former editor, Dr. W. G. Ward.

The choice of the title of the Review was dictated
partly, we should imagine, by way of distinctive contrast
with the Edinburgh, the name of the Irish capital sym
bolising a country as essentially Catholic as that of the
Scottish capital seemed suggestive of Knox and Cal
vinism ; and partly because it was intended to appeal
very largely for its support, both monetary and literary,
to the Green Isle of Erin, whose verdant livery has ever
been the distinctive colour of the Dublin, and whose
national arms, with the old motto Eire go brdth, in the
proper Erse characters, duly figured on the cover of
every number of the original series, and in smaller form
in those of the second series. The Review has, indeed,
from the beginning always been published in London,
but the connection with Ireland was from its earliest
days very close. At least one-half, oftentimes much
more, of the literary matter of the original series was
produced in Ireland ; and Irish topics political, social,
educational, or literary constantly occupied an impor
tant share of each quarter s bill of fare. A glance at the
table of contents for the earlier years will show this.
The first editor, to whom Cardinal Wiseman gives the
credit of the original conception of the Review, was Mr.
M. J. Quin, a native of Thurles, in Tipperary, a journalist
and lawyer of some note in his time (born 1796, died

18 2

276 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

1843). He, however, edited only the first two quarterly
numbers. The third number (December, 1836) was
edited by the well-known historical writer, the Rev.
M. A. Tierney, and the fourth and fifth (April and July,
J 837) by Mr. James Smith of Edinburgh, whose son was
the learned Dr. William Smith, afterwards second Arch
bishop of St. Andrew s and Edinburgh. With the sixth
number, the young magazine at last obtained a perma
nent editor in the person of Mr. H. R. Bagshawe, who
retained the editorial chair till the accession of Dr. Ward
in 1863. The causes of this uncertainty of tenure in
the editorial office were, alas ! of the financial kind,
which too often dog the steps of an incipient literary
venture. Fr. Russell cites a rather pathetic letter of
Quin to O Connell, dated from 25, Southampton Row,
Russell Square, January 2, 1837, m which he says :

" In obedience to your opinion, which to me is law, I
have surrendered all claim upon the Review funds for
any compensation whatever. . . . The question which
now remains to be settled is this In what mode is the
Review to be henceforth continued ? Its existence is a
matter of great importance to religion, to Ireland, to the
popular cause. It is impossible that I should edit and
write without being paid. A fund should be supplied
adequate to pay the editor a reasonable salary, and to
remunerate contributors for their articles. Whence is
this fund to proceed ? This is a question necessary to be
answered as soon as possible, in order that preparations
should be made forthwith for the fourth number. I
have no objection still to continue editor if you wish it,
but I cannot give any more of my time to the journal
without remuneration. In writing and in cash I have
already advanced to the Review upwards of 300. Is it
reasonable that I alone should be called upon to make
such a sacrifice as this ?"*

Publishers, too, were doomed to suffer from " that
eternal want of pence that vexes public men." The first
publisher was " William Spooner, 377, Strand." With
* Irish Monthly, vol. xxi., pp. 138, 139.

THE MAKERS OF " THE DUBLIN " 277

1838, " Booker and Dolman, 61, New Bond Street/
appear on the title-page, changed next year to " C. Dol
man (nephew and successor to J. Booker)," the address
remaining as before. In 1845 Dolman was succeeded
by Richardson and Son, and in 1862 the Richardsons by
the firm at first known as " Burns and Lambert," then
as " Burns, Lambert, and Gates," and finally by its
present style of " Burns and Gates." Of the financial
difficulties of the early years we learn a good deal from
a long letter of Mr. Charles Dolman to Mr. Daniel
O Connell, M.P., dated February n, 1839, which is
among the MSS. so obligingly placed at our disposal
by Fr. Russell. Dolman has most to say of the diffi
culties and risks of the undertaking, in which Mr.
Richards (the printer) and himself " have both lost so
much." " I undertook," he says in a subsequent letter
(March 29, 1843), "to be responsible for the payments
required to carry on the Review under the direction and
editorship of Bishop Wiseman* for the period of four
years, upon the assurance of support from the guarantee
fund which terminated with the last year." He again
complains that he has been a severe loser, and then
details a new plan proposed by Dr. Wiseman, and which
amounts to this " that the writers of articles shall
receive a joint interest in the Review, and will be content
to receive the proceeds of the sales, after paying the
printing expenses, for the remuneration." We also
gather from these letters that O Connell s annual con
tribution to the guarantee fund was 25. In a letter
of December 14, 1843, Dolman, acknowledging a last
instalment, thanks the great Irish statesman very
warmly for his powerful aid and protection, and for
having recommended the Review to the Irish clergy. He
thinks that it has hitherto had but slight support from
that quarter, but is " but too well aware that there has
been on some occasions reasons why perhaps the Review
would not (sic) and was not well received by them, and

* Dr. Wiseman had meanwhile been nominated Coadjutor
Vicar- Apostolic, and consecrated Bishop of Melipotamus in 1840.

278 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

justly so ; but I trust no such occasion will ever occur
again, and that past errors being forgot and forgiven,
the Review will reap the benefit of that union and support
for want of which it has hitherto languished."

Daniel O Connell long before this had published under
date February 18, 1838, his lithographed letter to the
Irish Bishops in favour of the Review, "of which I am
one of the proprietors." He says in the document :

" The object with which this publication was instituted
was and is to afford the Catholic literature of these
countries a fair and legitimate mode of exhibiting itself
to the people of the British Empire, and especially to the
people of Ireland, in the shape most likely to produce a
permanent as well as useful effect. The other quarterly
publications are in the hands either of avowed and
malignant enemies of Catholicity, or, what is worse,
insidious and pretended friends, who affect a false
liberality at the expense of Catholic doctrine.

" The Dublin Review, though not intended for purely
polemical discussion, contains many articles of the
deepest interest to the well-informed Catholic disputant.
The name of Dr. Wiseman, who is also a proprietor of the
work, insures the orthodoxy of the opinions contained
in it, and will be admitted to be in itself a pledge of the
extent, and depth, and variety of its scientific, as well
as theological, information."*

O Council s reference to the importance of Wiseman s
share in the undertaking was no whit exaggerated. The
evidence of this is to be found in his constant contribution
of admirable articles to the pages of the Review. These
articles, of high literary merit and containing a wealth
of erudition, cover a wide field ranging from theology
and patristic learning to the fine arts and belles-lettres.
Many of them are of permanent value. But over and
above this, Wiseman was practically the literary editor
of the Review, Bagshawe being little more than a business
editor. This is abundantly proved by his correspond-

* M. F. Cusack, " The Liberator ; his Life and Times," p. 643
(London, 1872).

THE MAKERS OF " THE DUBLIN " 279

ence with Dr. Russell, much of which lies before us
as we write. He is constantly discussing the articles
to be accepted or rejected, suggesting modifications,
enumerating the stock in hand for forthcoming numbers,
sketching projected series or individual articles, criti
cising, questioning, exulting, or complaining, as things
go satisfactorily or the contrary. The impression left by
a perusal of those letters models, by the way, of neat
ness and accuracy in penmanship and composition, in
spite of the almost crushing stress of official work,
especially after the erection of the Hierarchy is that
the Review was Wiseman s pet child. He writes about
it with the anxiety of a father for its future, his solicitude
for present weakness, his joy and pride at success
achieved and commendation won from strangers. We
must be allowed to make a few extracts :

" I find everyone pleased with Mr. Marshall s paper
[ Developments of Protestantism, March, 1846], though
long. Mr. Newman has spoken to me of it in high
admiration " (Letter, April 27, 1846).

And again :

" The other day I was at the British Museum Library,
when Panizzi spoke to me with great praise of your
article on Hippolytus [ The Newly-found Treatise
against All Heresies, December, 1852]. He told me he
had urged several of the very same objections to Mr.
Bunsen. But the way he read the article was this :
Cureton brought it to him, saying that Bunsen himself
had given it him to peruse ; he was so much pleased by
the gentlemanly and scholarly tone which pervaded it,
and the respect with which he was treated, all which
presented such a contrast to the manner in which he
had been handled in some Protestant reviews.

" From conversation with Panizzi, I am convinced
that the Dublin Review is much more known, and exer
cises much more influence, than we think. Panizzi
knows the old numbers and articles, and told me how he
had read them to friends in the library. Let us have a
good number next time " (Letter, January 30 [1853]).

280 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Elsewhere : " I am quite overwhelmed with subjects
for the Review."

Then comes a list of four important articles he is
planning on Scripture and theology, after which he adds :
" My light article I find is popular, but I fear people are
attributing it to me."

(This was an amusing article in the preceding number
September, 1849 entitled " The Art of Puffing.")
The very next sentence is prophetic, and shows what was
going on in the minds of Wiseman and others at the
time, the very year before the Hierarchy : "I have
heard nothing from Rome about the Primacy, but I
fear much " (Letter, Bexhill, October 17, 1849).

Some time before this, in a letter referring to some
necessary alterations in papers contributed by some of
the recent Oxford converts Oakeley, Morris, and others
we meet the gratifying remark : " There was not the
slightest difficulty in getting them all modified. Nothing
can exceed the docility of our converts " (Letter,
December 4, 1846). In a later letter, pleading extra
pressure of business, the newly made Cardinal tells his
faithful correspondent " we have been talking over
plans for improving the Review and combining it with a
paper" (London, December 18, 1850). But, fortunately,
perhaps, the " combination " never came off. Some
times we find him criticising the Review, and himself as
well. Thus :

" The Review is not deep. It wants some more reason
ing and original articles ; there seems to me to be too
much extract and mere analysis of works. ... As for
my own article [ The Bible in Maynooth, September,
1852], it was written far too hurriedly, and I ran off the
rails, and could not bring out what I wanted. Let us
get something good for next time " (Letter, October 2,
1852).

A few months later we have the following interesting
comments :

" Do you not think we are getting into too few hands ?

THE MAKERS OF " THE DUBLIN^" 281

Ward, De Morgan, Christie, Newman, Allies, etc., have
written for us, and now literally we are alone with
Robertson and Dr. Charlton. The rest are chiefly
extract papers. Surely the convert element ought to
be more cultivated. ... I see the growing narrowness
of our work, and deplore it. Never a paper on Physics,
Astronomical Discoveries, Chemistry, Electricity, Steam,
Railroads, Physiology, Medicine, Geology, Botany, Law
Reform, not even on politics in their wider sense. Never
any article on foreign countries, except the bleak North
I mean an original paper. ... As to myself, besides
Lent duties, which increase as the season advances, I
am now more and more overpowered by extraneous
business, which makes me feel the difference between a
Bishop or V.A. and an Archbishop, especially when
Cardinal" (Letter, Walthamstow, February 18, 1853).

The ever-growing pressure of business did not, how
ever, prevent the great Cardinal either from continuing
to contribute admirable articles of his own to the Review,
or from following with undiminished solicitude its career.
Three years later at the very moment he was recovering
" from that shabby complaint, influenza, which throws
none of the dignity or sympathy of illness around one "
he finds time to indite a long epistle containing some
what similar criticisms to those above quoted, but also
adding a projected programme of topics which he con
ceives ought to be discussed in the pages of the Review.
This syllabus is of sufficient interest to quote almost in
full. It runs thus :

" IRELAND.

" i. The State Church.

"2. The Catholic representation : its discharge of its
duties, etc.

"3. Education, and the efforts making to thwart and
undermine ours.

" 4. Proselytism : its history and condition.

" 5. Maynooth ; Queen s College ; Universities.

282 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

" 6. Land Question, Encumbered Estates Court ;
results of late changes in the population ; emigration,
colonization, etc.

"7. Agricultural and commercial industry, flax,
fisheries, etc.

" ENGLAND.

" 8. Progress of religion, and its wants.

" 9. Infidelity : its spread and remedies.
" 10. Puseyism ; Dennison, etc.
" ii. Charitable trusts.
" 12. Political position of Catholics.
"13. Education.

" FOREIGN.

"14. English and French alliance, every day becoming
a more delicate subject.

"15. Concordats ; Austria, Wiirtenburg (sic), Tuscany,
and Spain ; perhaps Russia. (My lectures on the Con
cordat having been translated into Italian and German,
have gone through several editions. In Austria especially
they have been much read. The Pope has read them,
and expressed himself much pleased.)

" 16. Defence of Catholic powers from the calumnies
of the press ....

"17. The true character of the Liberal party on the
Continent ; Mazzini, etc. (It is certain that all written
on such subjects is read with great avidity in the clubs.
Mr. Bowyer s two articles on Spain and Sardinia, for
which I furnished the documents, have done much
good.)

" 18. The theoretical literature of the Continent. . . .

" It seems to me that such matters as come under
these heads should be treated upon clear and definite
principles, and every number should bring one or more
before the Catholic mind so as to work it up into a clear
and consistent view " (Letter, November 7, 1856).

THE MAKERS OF " THE DUBLIN " 283

We learn from this same letter that " the root of the
evil " is still " the want of adequate means " to attract
writers of talent by suitable honoraria. " If anything
happened to Richardson we should be lost," the writer
concludes.

We ought, perhaps, to apologize for these lengthy
extracts, but they seem required to do justice to the
illustrious prelate who was really the father of the
Dublin Review, as well as to give an adequate impres
sion of the high ideal, the noble aims, which inspired him
during all the more than quarter of a century of his
intimate connection with it.

From Wiseman s private letters we may turn to one
or two articles published in the Review which convey
the same lessons. In one, entitled " The Present
Catholic Dangers " (December, 1856), he gives the
following summary of the twenty years life, then just
completed, of the periodical :

" During the twenty years existence of this Review,
during vicissitudes and struggles not easily paralleled
in the history of such publications, we believe it entitled
to one commendation. It was established for an end
which it has steadily kept in view. Thoroughly able
and willing to sympathise with the difficulties, the
traditions, the deep-worn feelings of Catholics, almost
before the dawn of the brighter era of conversion,
church-building, educational movement, and religious
bibliopolism had appeared on the horizon, its con
ductors endeavoured, gently and gradually, to move
forward the Catholic mind without shocking or violently
drawing away or aside thoughts familiar to it, and
growing side by side with its best inheritance. They
avoided all the troubled waters and eddies of domestic
contention ; nor is it among the least of many praises
due to the illustrious O Connell, who was one of its
founders, that, wrapped up as his whole external life
was in politics, he consented that the new quarterly
should not involve itself in their vortex, even to advocate

284 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

his own views, but should steer its own course along a
calmer stream, and try to bear along with it peaceful
and consenting minds.

" Whatever seemed useful to forward the interests of
Catholics, just released from the thraldom of ages, to
suggest greater boldness, opener confession of faith,
better taste, and especially greater familiarity with the
resources of Catholic ritual, Catholic devotion, or
Catholic feeling, was diligently studied and carried on
for years with a steady purpose that did its work."*

And when the original series was just drawing to its
close, in the last quarterly issue but one before it
passed into other hands, and little more than a couple
of years before his death, the great Cardinal, in that
noble article, " Our Responsibility," the very last he
ever contributed to the pages of the work with which
he had so long identified himself, penned a passage of
such dignity and beauty that we may well quote it,
both as his own literary epitaph and as his last message
and testament to those who should come after him
in the -conduct of his Review. It is as follows :

" From the very first number to this, every article
has been written or revised under the sense of the most
solemn responsibility to the Church, and to her Lord.
If we have been reproached, it has been rather for
severity in exclusion than for laxity in admission.
Many an article has been ejected rather than rejected,
even after being in type, because it was found not to
accord with the high and strict principles from which
its editorship has never swerved, and which it has never
abated. To him who has conducted it for so many years
a higher praise could scarcely be given, and by no one,
we are sure, has it ever been better deserved. That
occasionally an article or a passage may have crept in
which did not perfectly come up to the highest standard
of ecclesiastical judgment, is not only possible^but
probable. Absence, hurry, pressing occupation, ill-
* O.S., vol. xli., pp. 441, 442.

THE MAKERS OF " THE DUBLIN " 285

health, or even inadvertence and justifiable confidence,
will be sufficient to account for an occasional deviation
from rule, should anyone think he detects it. If so,
we are certain he will find its corrective or its rectification
in some other place.

" For from first to last, as we have said, this Review
has been guided by principles fixed and unalterable,
and those who have conducted it have done so with the
feeling that they must render an account of all that
they admitted. However long may be its duration,
and under whatever auspices, we are sure that the same
deep, earnest, and religious sense will pervade its pages
and animate its conductors, that their occupation is a
sacred one, a deputation to posterity that our children s
children may know how we adhered to the true faith
of their fathers, how we bore with patience and gentleness
the persecutions of our enemies, and how we never
swerved from justice to friend or foe. Our motto may
well be PROPTER VERITATEM, ET MANSUETUDINEM ET
JUSTITIAM."*

Vast as was the share of Cardinal Wiseman in the life
and success of the Review, it may be doubted whether
the periodical would ever have survived its early trials
but for the co-operation of that other eminent and
brilliant scholar, who all through those long years was
Wiseman s chief lieutenant and comrade in arms,
Dr. Charles Russell, of Maynooth. From the literary
point of view Dr. Russell had certainly the lion s share
of the actual work. His first article (" Versions of the
Scriptures"), contributed when he was a young pro
fessor of twenty-four, appeared in the second quarterly
issue of the Old Series (July, 1836) ; his last, " The
Critical History of the Sonnet," is to be found in the
fifty-fourth and fifty-fifth numbers of the Second Series
(October, 1876, and January, 1877). During this space
of forty years Dr. Russell was the most constant and
most indefatigable of contributors, and the wide range
* O.S., vol. lii., pp. 183, 184.

286 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

of the subjects treated, well characterised by the titles
of his first and last papers above cited, rivalled that of
Wiseman s, and gave evidence of vast erudition the
high literary skill and the versatile culture of one who
may perhaps claim to have been the most gifted Catholic
scholar of our times. For twenty years he contributed
absolutely to every number of the Review, and before
1860 a very large number of issues contain not one,
but several, papers from his prolific and graceful pen ;
in at least one instance he is credited with no less than
five articles. His articles were no mere " pot-boilers."
Very many of them were of the highest merit. We have
seen Bunsen s appreciation of the one concerning him
self. Another elaborate study on Lord Rosse s tele
scopes won him the esteem and lifelong friendship of
that distinguished astronomer.

The table of contents published in 1896, imperfect as
it is, will show the other eminent Catholic writers of the
day who formed part of the brilliant staff gathered round
Wiseman and Russell. Dr. Lingard contributed at least
three articles one on " Dodd s Church History of Eng
land " (May, 1839), one entitled " Did the Anglican
Church Reform Herself ?" (May, 1840), and one on
" The Ancient Church of England and the Liturgy of
the Anglican Church " (August, 1841). Newman,
apparently, wrote but a single article for the Review, the
one upon Keble s " Lyra Innocentium " in the issue of
June, 1846. The learned Drs. Murray and Croly, of
Maynooth, were very frequent contributors. So were
Dr. Abraham, Professor Robertson, J. F. Palmer,
and of course the editor, Mr. Bagshawe, besides others
too numerous to cite here. One article, the first in the
issue for February, 1843, is assigned in the editorial
list to John, Earl of Shrewsbury. To this Fi.
Russell appends the remark : " It proves to be an article
of sixty-six pages on recent charges delivered by Pro
testant prelates, among them Henry Edward Manning,
Archdeacon of Chichester. li the Earl wrote the

THE MAKERS OF " THE DUBLIN " 287

learned article he must have been helped by his
Chaplain."* The late Lord Chief Justice of
England is credited with a single article, in the issue
for August, 1860, on " The Civil Correspondence of
Wellington." In the Oscott list this is recorded as by
" Mr. Chas. A. Russell, Bar., London, nephew of
Dr. Russell." The article on " Carlyle s Works," in
the issue for September, 1850, which Carlyle, according
to Froude, found to be " excellently serious," and
conjectured to be from the pen of Dr. Ward, turns out
to have been written by John O Hagan, then a young
Newry barrister of twenty-eight, afterwards Mr. Justice
O Hagan, who appears once more in July, 1873, with
an article on the O Keefe case.

A word should be said of the style of these " Old
Dublin Reviewers." It partakes of the prevalent
" quarterly " style of its time grave, dignified, erudite
each article commencing with a deliberate " exordium "
of more or less rhetorical character, with reflections of
a very general nature sometimes gemino ab ovo, and
occasionally rather remote from the subject in hand.
The strict Review form is also maintained, and every
article " hangs upon its own proper peg " in the form
of the titles of a book or books, or even the Times
newspaper, duly cited at its head. Our more busy
times, perhaps, would be impatient of this old-fashioned
and stately procedure. Yet it cannot be denied that
the old Dublins have a charm of erudition and style
all their own. " What treasures of orthodox erudition,"
to quote Fr. Russell once more, " contained in those
old volumes . . . what labour, thought, learning, and
piety of many hearts and minds are represented in this
long series of half-yearly tomes !"f

The list of articles has, too, its historical value.
Looked at chronologically, it represents a complete
picture of the history of Catholic thought and life for the

* Irish Monthly, vol. xxi,, p. 85.

f Ibid., vols. xxi., p. 90 ; xxii., p. 637.

288 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

best part of the last century. Beginning almost before
the first stirring of the waters of the Oxford Movement,
and under the very shadow of penal days, the succeeding
volumes gradually introduce us to the full strife of those
intellectually stirring times, with Wiseman as the
protagonist on the Catholic side. In No. 13 (August,
1839) we come, with almost a shock of glad surprise,
upon the now historical article, nay, upon the very page
and the very footnote (vol. vii., p. 154) of that article,
of which we knew from his own words that it was the
" shadow of the hand upon the wall " to John Henry
Newman the protagonist on the Anglican side and
the means in God s Providence which was to decide
his future for him. That simple footnote on p. 154
contains "the palmary words of St. Augustine "-
securus judicat orbis twrarum which ever afterwards,
Newman tells us in his "Apologia," "kept ringing in
my ears," and " struck me with a power which I had
never felt from words before. . . . By those great words
of the ancient Father, the theory of the Via Media was
absolutely pulverized." And, he adds, " he who has
seen a ghost cannot be as if he had never seen it." If
the Dublin Review had no other title to gratitude it
might securely rest its fame on having given to the world
that Article VI. of its thirteenth quarterly number,
whose effect had been more far-reaching than that
of any other magazine article ever written. Gradually
the leaders of the Tractarian Movement, from being
opponents to be fought with and convinced, come over
one by one to us, and in their turn take their places
in our ranks as contributors to the Review. Ward,
Oakeley, and Marshall simultaneously appear together
(as far as our deficient records inform us) in the March
issue of 1846 ; the two first-named become very frequent
contributors. Morris, Christie, Formby, Capes, Allies,
Anderdon, Manning (December, 1854), Ffoulkes, and
other converts of note gradually appear in the list
side by side with the members of the older staff. Mean-

THE MAKERS OF " THE DUBLIN " 289

while we have come to the epoch of the Hierarchy, and
the new Cardinal Archbishop himself in two consecutive
numbers (December, 1850, and March, 1851) presents
the Catholic view of that burning question. And
similarly space will not allow us to give further
examples all the great contemporary movements in
Church and State, in education and literature, in
scientific discovery and exploration, are faithfully re
flected, as in a mirror, in the Dublin s table of contents.
One could compile a history of the times from the con
temporary pages of the old Dublin alone.

Before laying aside for good the volumes of the
Original Series we may add one or two little items,
rather of interest than of importance, that we have jotted
down in the course of our pleasant task of examin
ing these old tomes. Lady writers are by no means
the novelty people might imagine them to be in our
grave quarterly. The first paper by a lady appears as
early as the fourth volume, being on " Irish Novels and
Irish Novelists " (April, 1838), attributed to Mrs. Fitz-
simons. This lady was a daughter of Daniel O Connell.
It is also somewhat surprising to note that the early
Review was not always shy of illustrations. Plates or
woodcuts adorn several articles on architecture and
archaeology,* as well as the one above referred to on
Rosse s telescopes.f Wiseman, in his letters to Russell,
several times complains of the length of articles. No
wonder : in vol. xlvi., No. 92 (June, 1859) an article by
Finlayson, on " The Government of the Papal States,"
actually occupies 125 pages. By way of contrast, the
following year, in vol. xlviii., No. 96 (August, 1860),
Miss St. John contents herself with a space of a little
over five and a half pages for her last article. Editors
must have been made of less stern stuff in those days
than in ours.

But, lest we should yield to the temptation of becoming

* Vols. ix., No. 1 8 ; x., No. 20 ; xii., No. 23 ; xix., No. 37.
f Vol. xviii., No. 35.

19

2go SKETCHES IN HISTORY

garrulous, without the excuse of old age, we must regret
fully close the venerable tomes of the " Wiseman-
Russell " era, and turn our attention, though more
briefly, to the series which followed.

II.

A decided alteration, both in outward appearance and
in style and tendency, marks the " New Series," which
began in July, 1863, with Dr. W. G. Ward as proprietor
and editor, dnd Mr. Cashel Hoey as sub-editor. Dr.
Ward s own tastes and talents very naturally impressed
themselves strongly upon his Review. Metaphysics now
tended to come more and more to the front in the
literary menu. Dr. Ward was the chief antagonist of
John Stuart Mill, and esteemed by that philosopher as
the foeman best worthy of his steel. Hence much of
the long metaphysical duel between those two leading
minds was fought out in the pages of the Dublin. Three
other lines of thought were also represented by Dr.
Ward s own writings in the Review during this time
one regarding the Papal Infallibility, another touching
the " Relations between Religion and Politics," and the
third on the burning question of " Catholics and the
Higher Education." In a memorial article by Cardinal
Manning on the occasion of Ward s death (Third Series,
October, 1882), a list is given of all Ward s contributions
under these heads (pp. 268-270), to which the reader may
be referred. We must remark, however, that he will
find some considerable discrepancies between these lists
and that compiled from the memoranda of Mr. Cashel
Hoey in the Irish Monthly (April, 1893). Cardinal
Manning, in the article referred to, writes as follows :

" What [the Review] owed to him during the sixteen
years in which he was not only editor but chief contri
butor, and what aid, even after he had ceased to conduct
it, he still gave by a constant series of philosophical
writings, is well known. And yet the importance of his

THE MAKERS OF " THE DUBLIN" 291

work is perhaps fully known only to a few who were in
immediate contact with him and with the Dublin Review.
The great success of the First Series of the Dublin Review,
when it was sustained by the contributions of the illus
trious group of men who surrounded the late Cardinal
Wiseman in his early career, had, by the same order of
time and nature by which we also are now deprived,
begun to decline. In the year 1862 Cardinal Wiseman
gave to me the legal proprietorship of the Dublin Review
on the condition that I would insure its continuation.
After certain preliminary endeavours, Mr. Ward accepted
in full the responsibility of editor. He has stated that
all articles passed under the judgment of three censors,
who were charged to examine the bearing of them on
faith, morals, and ecclesiastical prudence. From the
time he undertook the office of editor, he threw himself
into it as the work and way in which, as a layman, he
was to serve the Church. . . . Perhaps the only other
contemporaneous example of the all but identity of an
editor with his periodical is Brownson s Review. In both
cases the power of mind in the editor impressed a domi
nant character upon the work. This fact may have
made the Review less interesting to general readers, but
it greatly increased its intrinsic value. . . . The Second
Series of the Dublin Review did not rank among literary
magazines, but it fairly won and kept its place among
the weightier and more serious quarterly periodicals."*
Ward himself, in what he justly styles a " personal "
article, contributed to vol. viii., No. 15, of his periodical
(January, 1867), in the form of a review of his own
fourteen preceding numbers, defends the New Series with
considerable spirit from two adverse criticisms the
one directed against " what is considered the undue pre
ponderance given by us to theology "; the other, " that
our tone is too peremptory and overbearing, that we
erect our own private opinion into a kind of a shibboleth
(as it has been expressed to us), and that we speak of
* N. S., vol. viii., pp. 265, 266.

192

292 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

those who oppose our own private views just as though
they opposed the Church s authoritative teaching."*
Those were, indeed, the days of hot controversy and
hard hitting all round. Very warm waxed the war
fare round dogmatic questions like the Vatican Council,
the Papal Infallibility and its extent, the Syllabus,
and religious " liberalism," and the vexed questions
of Catholic colleges and the national universities. The
atmosphere in which the " Ward Series " lived was
therefore essentially polemical, both with regard to
external foes and to internal disputants. In the con
cluding number of the series (October, 1878) Cardinal
Manning, in a " letter " which forms the first article,
gives a general approval to the line taken up by Ward in
the course of these controversies. His Eminence also
adds :

" In the course of this period three special subjects of
great moment have been forced both by events and by
anti-Catholic public opinion upon our attention I mean
the Temporal Power of the Holy See, the relations of the
Spiritual and Civil Powers, and the Infallibility of the
Head of the Church. In all these your vigilant and
powerful writings have signally contributed to produce
the unity of mind which exists among us, and a more
considerate and respectful tone even in our antagonists." f

As we have said, we are not writing the " Secret
History " of the Dublin ; that is a matter to be left to a
future and a more remote generation. The very wide
difference of opinion, and the almost acrimonious tone
of discussion which they engendered among men of the
highest intellectual and spiritual excellence, have left
traces both in published articles and in private corre
spondence. We can now afford to look back calmly on
the burning domestic questions of thirty years ago,
and to recognise the earnestness of purpose and convic
tion of the disputants on both sides.

* N. S., vol. viii., pp. 164, 167.
f N. S., vol. xxxi., pp. 275, 276.

THE MAKERS OF "THE DUBLIN" 293

In his reply to Cardinal Manning s gracious message,
Ward, in the same number, pays a handsome tribute to
his faithful lieutenant :

" It has been the chief felicity " (he says) " of my
editorial lot that I have obtained the co-operation of one
so eminently qualified to supply these deficiencies as
Mr. Cashel Hoey. It was once said to me most truly
that he has rather been joint-editor than sub-editor.
One-half of the Review has been in some sense under his
supreme control ; and it is a matter of extreme gratifica
tion to look back at the entire harmony which has pre
vailed from the first between him and myself. In the
various anxieties which inevitably beset me from time
to time, he has invariably shown himself, not only to be
a calm and sagacious adviser, but even more, to be the
most cordial and sympathetic of friends."*

The staff of writers gathered around Ward and Cashel
Hoey was also a very brilliant one. Dr. Russell, indeed,
as we have seen, continued his active co-operation up to
the beginning of 1877, as also did Dr. Murray. The
latter s article " The Vatican Council : its Authority
and Work " in the issue for January, 1873, was con
sidered by Dr. Ward, we are told,f the best paper
he had ever sent to him " during the same series. Pro
fessor St. George Mivart commenced his long critical
" Examination of Herbert Spencer s Psychology,"
which continued its career right into the Third Series.
Other writers who contributed to the series were
Mr. Edward Healy Thompson, Fr. Anderdon, S.J.,
Fr. Coleridge, S.J., Mr. J. C. Earle, Mr. W. H. Wilber-
force, Canon Oakeley, Canon (afterwards Bishop)
Hedley, Fr. Roger Bede Vaughan, O.S.B. (after
wards Archbishop of Sydney), Fr. Herbert Vaughan,
D.D. (the late Cardinal Archbishop), Mr. Allies, Dr. Ives
(the converted Bishop of the Episcopal Church of
America), Mr. David Lewis, Mr. Marshall, and, of course,

* N. S., vol. xxxi., pp. 277, 278.
t Irish Monthly, vol. xxi., p. 209.

294 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

both Mr. and Mrs. Cashel Hoey. These names, at least,
besides a few others, have been preserved for us in the
sub-editor s memoranda, which are, unfortunately, very
incomplete. Fr. Russell opines that the touching
" filial memorial " on the death of Cardinal Wiseman,
which opens the April issue for 1865, was penned by Dr.
Manning, so soon to succeed to the vacant archiepiscopal
throne. That " memorial" contains Cardinal Wiseman s
own memorandum, dated Easter, 1853, narrating the
origin and early history of the Dublin, which appeared as
preface to his volume of " Essays " issued in that year,
and from which we have already quoted. It also
records the fact that :

11 In the last two years since it passed into other
hands the declining health of our lamented Cardinal
compelled him to postpone again and again the kind and
encouraging promises he made to us of contributions
from his pen. No line written by him has therefore
appeared in it."*

The following well-merited panegyric of Wiseman s
work in the Old Series is added :

" If at the end of our labours the Second Series of the
Dublin Review should yield from all the hands which
may contribute to it three volumes of essays worthy to
stand afar off by those of Cardinal Wiseman, for beauty,
variety, learning, freshness, originality above all, for
pure, solid Catholic doctrine and high filial devotion to
Rome we shall hope that we have not failed in the
trust which he has bequeathed to us."

III.

The final number of the Second or " Ward Series " of
the Review (October, 1878), concluding its thirty-first
volume, contained a fly-leaf with the following announce
ment :

" The historic Dublin, now in the forty-second year

* N. S., vol. iv., p. 270.

THE MAKERS OF " THE DUBLIN " 295

of its existence, has been made over by Mr. W. G. Ward
to his lordship the Bishop of Salford. On the first of
January, the first number of a new, or Third Series, will
appear, under the editorship of the Right Rev. Bishop
Hedley.

" While faithfully adhering to the great Catholic prin
ciples for the maintenance of which it came into exist
ence, and which have been its raison d etre and its very
life for over forty years, the Dublin Review will now
undergo certain modifications, calculated to render it
more widely popular and more acceptable to a larger
number of tastes and interests.

" The Review, in its Third Series, will aim at maintain
ing its traditional high standard of theological and
metaphysical science ; in its historical, literary, and
political articles it will endeavour to combine solidity
and usefulness with brilliancy of treatment ; and each
number will contain a summary of the contents of foreign
Catholic contemporary periodicals, short notices of all
new Catholic works, and a quarterly review of science.

The work of the Dublin Review will be, as heretofore,
to deepen Catholic intellectual life ; to promote Catholic
interests ; to enlighten and assist those who are seeking
for Catholic truth ; to utter warnings against dangers
to faith and practice ; and to diminish as far as possible
that friction arising from national, local, or personal
narrowness which retards the onward march of Catholic
principle. Its motto, as that of all Catholic journals,
must be Truth, Culture, and Conciliation.

" In order to render the Review the more interesting,
all the articles will be signed with the names of the
writers."

The strict rule of anonymity had already been partially
relaxed in the Second Series. The " Historical Notes of
the Tractarian Movement," which appeared in its earlier
issues, were signed by their author, Canon Oakeley.
Initials, like " M. D. T.," " T. F. M." (i.e., Mathew), and
" R.^ E. G.," were occasionally allowed to appear.

296 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Papers by Mr. St. G. Mivart (October, 1876), Fr. H.
Formby (January, 1877), and the Hon. W. (afterwards
Lord) Petre (July, 1878), were published over their
authors full names, the object of Dr. Ward being to allow
certain of his contributors liberty to express views with
which he did not desire the Review or its editor to be
identified. In the Third Series the signing of articles
was carried out as a principle, though by no means uni
formly observed ; in No. 9 (January, 1881) only a single
article, by Bishop Spalding, is signed or acknowledged !
By degrees, however, the custom became practically
universal. Librarians will do well to note that for the
first four volumes of the Third Series the numeration of
the second was continued xxxii. to xxxv. ; with the
next volume the New Series began an independent
numbering of its own, and the first half-yearly volume
of 1881 is marked vol. v. This was carried on up to
the close of the series, the last volume of it being xxvi.,
which ended 1891.

As announced in the circular quoted, the Third Series
opened under the editorship of the Right Rev. John
Cuthbert Hedley, O.S.B., the learned Bishop of New
port, who himself contributed to the first number the
admirable article on " Catholicism and Culture," which
opens the series. This first issue (January, 1879) na( ^
also the fortune to secure an article on "The Work and
Wants of the Church in England," from the pen of Car
dinal Manning, and one on " The Evangelization of
Africa," from that of his destined successor, Bishop (after
wards Cardinal) Vaughan. The series thus began under
very bright auspices, and a number of very distinguished
names appear in the table of contents of subsequent
numbers. Cardinal Manning is credited with at least
five subsequent articles, of which the last (July, 1891)
was entitled " Leo XIII. on the Condition of Labour,"
but half a year before the great Cardinal s death. We
learn from some editorial correspondence that His
Eminence had also planned a paper upon General

THE MAKERS OF " THE DUBLIN" 297

Gordon early in 1885, but unfortunately f< gives it up
has not time." The article on the subject which did
appear in April (" The Destiny of Khartoum ") was,
though not signed, from the indefatigable pen of Miss
E. M. Clarke, whose industry as a Dublin reviewer during
this series rivals that of Dr. Russell himself ; and we
gather that Gordon s sister " wrote to the writer to thank
her for it, as expressive of her own feelings in the portion
where Gordon s desertion is described." Another future
Cardinal, Dr. Moran, at that time Bishop of Ossory,
contributed an interesting paper on " The Birthplace of
St. Patrick " to the issue of April, 1880, and one on " The
Condition of Catholics in Ireland a Hundred Years Ago "
to that of January, 1882. The late Bishop Clifford, of
Clifton, brought out in those of April and October, 1881,
his novel theory concerning the " Days of the Week and
the Works of Creation," which excited no little interest
and controversy at the time. Among other episcopal
contributors to the series will be noticed the erudite
Bishop Healy, Bishop Ullathorne, and, of course, the
episcopal editor. This Third Series also secured a large
share of foreign contributors a very rare feature in the
earlier series. Among these we meet with Professors de
Harlez, Lamy, Alberdingk Thijm, and Colinet of Louvain,
the Abbe Motais, Bishop Spalding of Peoria, and Senator
Power of Ottawa.

Other novelties announced in the programme were
duly introduced, and have since remained marked
features of the Dublin, differentiating it to some extent
from other old quarterlies. The department of book
notices received a very considerable extension. In the
earliest issues of the Original Series, no notices of the
kind appear, but only an occasional " summary " of
foreign literature, though, strange to say, for several
years a short appendix of " Miscellaneous Intelligence,"
political as well as religious, was added to each issue.
The notices of books appear to have commenced with
the May number of 1840, in vol. viii., Original Series,

298 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

but, even to the end of the series, never exceeded very
modest proportions. Dr. Ward s series gave a much
greater development to these short reviews ; but in the
Third and Fourth Series they have assumed still larger
importance. Other new and useful departments now
added were the " Science Notes " and " Notes on Travel
and Exploration " still regularly continued.

Bishop Hedley was ably assisted in his editorial duties
by an excellent sub-editor, the Rev. W. E. Driffield,
whose name deserves to be recorded with due honour side
by side with those of Bagshawe and Cashel Hoey. At
the close of 1884 Dr. Hedley resigned the editorial chair
which was then assumed by the Right Rev. Herbert
Vaughan, then Bishop of Salford, who thus again, like
Dr. Ward, combined the functions of proprietor and
editor, which he retained till the close of 1891. The
multifarious duties and occupations of the editor s busy
episcopal life very naturally threw an ever-increasing
share of labour upon the devoted sub-editor, and to a
very considerable extent Father Driffield may be said to
have been rather the acting editor during the last few
years of the series.

With the beginning of 1892 the editorship was con
ferred upon the Right Rev. James Moyes, D.D., since
Canon Theologian of Westminster, and with the change
commenced also the Fourth Series of the Dublin Review.
There was somewhat of an alteration in outward appear
ance, and in one respect at least a reversion to the
memories of the Original " Wiseman " Series. The new
first volume of the series was numbered vol. ex., the
numeration thus going right back to the beginning, and
the first issue bore number " 220," by a curious mis
calculation, which will puzzle some future librarian,
for it should have been " 219." This first quarterly
issue was scarcely in the hands of its readers when the
whole country was shocked by the news of the death
of the venerable Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster,
who himself twenty-seven years before had consecrated

THE MAKERS OF " THE DUBLIN" 299

in the pages of the Review a " Memorial " to his
predecessor, Cardinal Wiseman. A graceful and pathetic
memorial article from the pen of the lamented Fr. Lock-
hart appeared in the subsequent issue (April, 1892).
It is interesting also to note that the opening article
of this Fourth Series was that on " England s Devo
tion to St. Peter," by the then Bishop of Salford, who,
at the very moment the second part of the article was
issuing from the press in the April number, had succeeded
Manning and Wiseman on the metropolitan throne of
Westminster, as he had succeeded them in the proprietor
ship of the " historic Dublin." The intimate connec
tion between the three successive Cardinal Archbishops
of Westminster and the great Catholic quarterly, of
which this coincidence is but the outward symbol, is not
a little remarkable, and confirms the impression of the
very large part played by the Review in the history
of Catholic thought and life during sixty years.

It will be unnecessary to say more about the Review,
now in its seventieth year of existence, and with the
whole twentieth century, as we may hope, before it.
If the past be any augury of the future, the omens are
certainly propitious. We can heartily wish it God
speed in its career.

Certain writers have sometimes speculated, in idle
mood, what work they would choose if condemned
for years to solitary imprisonment, or to banishment
on a desert isle, with no other companion than one
single set of volumes. Was it not Matthew Arnold
who thought he would select Migne s edition of the
Fathers ? * The present writer is not at all sure whether,
if he were in the predicament, he would not take for
his choice the volumes of the Dublin Review from
1836 to 1906.

* And, strangely enough, in a paper concerning an article in
the Dublin Review itself !

XII
THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN

I. THE ANCIENT CHURCH OF JAPAN.

THE war of 1894-95 between the nations of the extreme
East, the collapse of the Chinese Goliath and the unvary
ing success of the Japanese David, and the still more
astonishing Titanic contest between Russia and Japan
of 1904-5, have excited a widespread and intense interest
in all that relates to Japan and the Japanese.

But the Japanese have an attractiveness all their own,
and quite independent of any temporary political
circumstances. The race is an extremely interesting
one in itself. This has been well expressed not long
ago by a competent observer. M. Ribaud, a Catholic
missionary of Hakodate, writes thus in the Missions
Catholiques of Lyons for February 22, 1895 :

" The beauty of this province of Miyagi, which we are
now traversing, is suggestive of thought. We seem to
have before us some beautiful scene in Greece. Greece ?
Yes, for Japan is not a little like to Greece. Has not
Japan landscapes as lovely as those of Athens, Corinth,
or Ionia ? Does the pellucid atmosphere of Miyagi or
Iwate yield in delicacy to that of Attica ? And if the
physical features and climate of Japan are like to those
of Greece in so many ways, are they not likely to impress
upon the Japanese character some traits of the Hellenic
type ? The vivacity of wit, the facility and abundance
of speech, which have rendered the Athenian name

300

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 301

famous, are to be found to a striking degree among the
Japanese. The ri KOLLVOV, which paints so well the in
satiable curiosity of the Greek, is at every instant on the
lips of the Japanese.* What shall I say of the passion
for independence, fostered in Greece by the very nature
of the soil ? It is found, for the same reason, in Japan,
carried to its highest pitch, and with it the love of
country. If we peruse the annals, without pushing our
researches into ancient times that nebulous period
wherein we see the Empress Jingo marching to the
conquest of Corea nor even to the sanguinary struggles
of the fourteenth century, in which the celebrated
leyasu, breaking through all the obstacles with his
puissant hand, succeeded in snatching the sceptre from
the Mikado but simply glancing at the recent revolu
tions which have restored to the Emperor the authority
of which he had been despoiled, how many traits of
valour, energy, and ardent patriotism do we not discover
which need not pale side by side with the noblest deeds of
patriotism of the heroes of Thermopylae and Mantinaea !"

But the history, present condition, and prospects of
Christianity in Japan is a subject which scarcely needs
these considerations to render it one of surpassing
interest. The contact between a race so highly endowed
by nature as that of the Japanese and the powerful
leaven of Christianity, must of necessity produce reac
tions and results destined to be little less momentous
than similar contacts in the past between Christianity
and, let us say, the Keltic and Anglo-Saxon races. To
the student of philosophy, as well as to the historian, it
must be interesting in the highest degree to watch such
processes of spiritual chemistry.

The ancient island-empire of Nippon was first made

* " The Japanese are very curious by nature," wrote St.
Francis Xavier in 1551, "and as desirous of learning as ever
any people were. . . . They desire very much to hear novelties,
especially about religion " (Letter Ixxxiv., Coleridge, vol. ii.,
p. 300).

302 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

known to the Western world under the name of
" Cipangu " in 1295 by Marco Polo, the famous Venetian
traveller, and from that time forward appeared on maps,
its discovery being among the objects which Columbus
set before him in his memorable voyages to the West.
The first Europeans to reach the archipelago, however,
were three Portuguese fugitives, who were driven upon
the southern islands in 1542 the very same year, by
the way, in which St. Francis Xavier landed at Goa.
But much more important events were the two visits of
Mendez Pinto in 1545 and 1547, of which he himself has
left a detailed account, published in English by Mr.
H. Cogan in 1891. In the second of these visits Pinto
received on board a Japanese fugitive named Anjiro (or
Han-Siro) and his servant. Taken to Malacca, the two
Japanese there made the acquaintance of St. Francis
Xavier, who was intensely interested in the two fugitives
and in what they had to tell him of their country. He
took them with him to Goa, where both were instructed
and became Christians, Anjiro being baptized under the
name of Paul- of the Holy Faith.

Those acquainted with the life of the Apostle of the
Indies, and more especially readers of Fr. Coleridge s
admirable " Life and Letters of St. Francis Xavier," will
scarce need reminding how deep an impression was made
on the saint s mind by what he heard from these
Japanese converts, and how Japan became to him truly
a land of predilection. From the moment of his meeting
with Anjiro the idea of a missionary expedition to Japan
took hold of his soul.

It was not until 1549 that Francis was able to under
take his great task the evangelization of the island-
empire. On April 25 he embarked at Cochin for Malacca,
whence, on the Nativity of St. John Baptist, he sailed
for Japan " on board the ship of a heathen merchant, a
Chinaman." The voyage lasted seven weeks, and a
most interesting account of it is given by Francis himself
in his first letter from the place of his arrival. He had

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 303

with him the two Japanese, Anjiro (otherwise " Paul of
the Holy Faith ") and the latter s servant, Fr. Cosmo
de Torres, and a lay-brother, Joao Fernandez.

" So by the guidance of God," he writes, " we came at
last to this country, which we had so much longed for,
on the very day of the Feast of Our Blessed Lady s
Assumption, 1549. We could not make another port,
and so we put into Cagoxima, which is the native place
of Paul of the Holy Faith. We were most kindly received
there both by Paul s relations and connections and also
by the rest of the people of the place."*

The port of Cagoxima i.e., Kagoshimaf lies upon
the deep inlet which indents the southern extremity of
Kyushu, the southernmost island of the archipelago.
It was at the time the capital of the principality of
Satsuma. The first successes of the saint and his com
panions were truly gratifying. We have his own words
for it. He writes :

" The prince of this place was six leagues away from
Cagoxima, and when Paul went to pay his respects to
him he was very glad of his return, and showed him much
honour, asking him also a great many things about the
manners, the power, and the resources of the Portuguese.
When Paul told him all about them, he seemed to be
very highly delighted with what he had heard. Paul
had taken with him a very fine picture of Our Blessed
Lady with the Child Jesus sitting in her lap, which we
had brought from India. When the prince saw the
picture which Paul had brought he was quite struck with
wonder ; he at once fell on his knees and venerated it
in the most pious manner, and ordered all who were
present to do the same. After this his mother saw it
and gazed upon it, and was filled with wonderful admira-

* Coleridge, vol. ii., p. 232.

f We shall adopt in this paper the spelling of modern Orien
talists for Japanese names and words. It must be remembered
that the early Jesuit missioners spelled according to the Portu
guese sounds. The Portuguese x is pronounced as sh.

304 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

tion and delight ; and a few days after, when Paul had
returned to Cagoxima, she sent a man and a very good
person he was to see about getting a copy of it taken
somehow or other. However, there were no means of
doing the thing at Cagoxima, and so the matter went no
further. The same lady sent us a request by the same
hand that we would give her in writing the chief points of
the Christian religion. So Paul devoted some days to
this work, and wrote out in his own native language a
great many things concerning Christian mysteries and
laws. You may take my word for it, and also give God
great thanks, that a very wide field is here opened to you
for your well-roused piety to spend its energies in."

In this same very long letter, addressed to the Society
at Goa, Francis, besides a very full account of the
Japanese manners and customs, gives us his opinion of
the Japanese people, of whom he speaks with something
like enthusiasm. " The nation with which we have had
to do here," he declares, " surpasses in goodness any of
the nations lately discovered. I really think that among
barbarous nations there can be none that has more
natural goodness than the Japanese."

St. Francis Xavier stayed little more than two years
in Japan. He and his companions laboured successively
at Hirado, Hakata, Yamaguchi, Kyoto,* and Bungo,
though with very varying success. The Prince of
Satsuma himself became hostile, influenced by the
jealousy of the Buddhist bonzes. At Yamaguchi the
mean and forlorn appearance of Francis caused him to
be driven out of the city with obloquy. Yet his two
years stay in Japan produced an indelible impression.
The Church of Japan was securely founded, and from the
sweat and tears of its first great apostle there sprang that
glorious harvest which was destined to ripen in an
incredibly short space of time.

St. Francis Xavier left Japan in the November of 1551.

* Called by St. Francis " Myako " i.e., the capital, for such
it was in his time.

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 305

His intention was to visit the vast empire of China, and
then begin to sow the seeds of Christianity as he had
done in Nippon. He had heard much about China
whilst in the neighbouring kingdom, and had met
Chinamen there. " The Chinese whom I have seen,"
he says, " are acute and eager to learn. Their intellect
is superior even to the Japanese." And again : " China
is that sort of kingdom that, if the seed of the Gospel is
once sown, it may be propagated far and wide."* But
it was not merely the desire to carry the truth to China
that moved Francis to this new expedition. He saw in
it a means of reacting upon his beloved Japan. For, as
he remarks in one of his letters, the Japanese used to
especially urge against the Christian teaching " that if
things were as we preached, how was it that the Chinese
knew nothing about them ?" This was only natural,
since Japan had derived her civilization, her letters, her
religion from China, and consequently " the Japanese
have a very high idea of the wisdom of the Chinese,
whether as to the mysteries of religion, or as to manners
and civil institutions." 1 ) 1 And, writing to his great
superior, St. Ignatius, just after leaving Japan, he says
explicitly : " As soon as the Japanese learn that the
Chinese have embraced the faith of Jesus Christ, there
is reason to hope that the obstinacy with which they are
attached to their own false sects will be lessened. "J
This same letter to St. Ignatius betrays the depth of the
affection which attached St. Francis to this people, for he
exclaims therein : "No words can express all that I owe
to the Japanese." And how wonderful in the light of
subsequent history is the prophecy contained in another
part of this letter, where he writes : " As far as I know,
the Japanese nation is the single and only nation of them
all which seems likely to preserve unshaken and for ever
the profession of Christian holiness if once it embrace

* Letter Ixxxvi., Coleridge, p. 348.

f Letter Ixxxiv., Coleridge, pp. 300, 301.

J Letter Ixxxviii., Coleridge, p. 373.

20

306 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

it." These words will surely recur to our memory later
on in reading of the event of March 17, 1865 !

Everyone knows that St. Francis Xavier was never
destined to reach the shores of China, and that he died
an outcast on the little island of San Chan, at the mouth
of the Canton river, on December 2, 1552, like Moses in
sight of the Promised Land.

The following half-century marks an epoch of marvel
lous prosperity in the Japanese missions. Numerous
Jesuit Fathers and lay-brothers were sent over, as Francis
had desired, to carry on the work so auspiciously begun.
Within thirty years it is calculated that over 200,000
Japanese, including several bonzes, had been converted,
and the Princes of Omura, Bungo, and Arima were
among these neophytes. Nagasaki was the chief focus
of Christian life. By 1567 it was said that the popula
tion of that city was almost entirely Catholic. The
virtual ruler of Japan at this time was Nobunaga, the
celebrated Minister and commandant of the forces. This
able Minister was distinctly favourable to the Christians
during all his administration of nine years (1573-1582).
All this time the Jesuit Fathers had been pushing forward
their apostolic work, and had met with marvellous
success. In Kyoto and Yamaguchi, in Osaka and Sakai,
as well as in Kyushu, they had founded flourishing
churches, established colleges for the formation of a
native clergy, opened hospitals and asylums, and ex
tended their influence far and wide. The latter part of
Nobunaga s supremacy was perhaps the era of their
greatest prosperity. At this time Chamberlain estimates
the number of Japanese Christians at not less than
600,000. Nobunaga s patronage of the Christians was
largely inspired by political motives. His strong
Government had made him hated by the Buddhist
bonzes, whose overwhelming power he effectually held in
check, and who looked upon him as a usurper, as he
technically was. It was this disaffection of the bonzes
that led him to support the Christian missionaries.

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 307

They seem to have attributed his patronage to higher
motives, and to have looked forward to his conversion.
But though churches were built under his patronage at
Kyoto and at Azuchi, on Lake Biwa, near his own
beautiful residence, he never seems to have seriously
intended to become a Christian. For some time after
Nobunaga s death nothing occurred to interfere with the
development of the Church ; indeed, that date (1582)
coincides with the mission of Fr. Valignani from
Gregory XIII., now to be mentioned.

The fervour, zeal, and devotion of these new Christians
were worthy of the early days of Christianity. The Holy
See was very soon able to rejoice in the addition to the
fold of legions of devoted children. Gregory XIII.
deputed Fr. Alessandro Valignani, S.J., with gifts to
the converted Japanese princes, and they in their turn in
1582 despatched a solemn embassy to Rome, consisting
of two young princes and two counsellors, who were
accompanied by Fr. Valignani and another Jesuit.
This embassy was received with all state and splendour
both by Gregory XIII., who died during their stay in
Rome (1585), and by his successor, Sixtus V. But on
their return to their native country the Japanese dele
gates found that troubles had already broken out.*

It was in 1587 that the first anti-Christian edict was
issued by the celebrated Taiko-Sama, one of the greatest
rulers Japan has ever known ; and the years from that
date till 1650 may be fairly designated the era of the

* This was not the only Japanese embassy to the Holy See at
that time. At the Tenth International Congress of Orientalists,
held at Geneva in September, 1894, the eminent Sinologue, Pro
fessor Valenziani, of Rome, read a paper on two passages of the
" Nippon hyak kets den," a kind of biographical encyclopaedia,
by which he established the fact that during the last years of
the sixteenth century Gamau Udji-sato, daimyo of Aidzou, sent
no less than four different embassies to the reigning Pontiff,
with the purely political object of detaching him from the
Spaniards, against whom the Japanese were contending in the
Philippines. As the President of the section, Professor Schlegel,
remarked, these facts were entirely new and hitherto unknown
to European scholars.

20 2

308 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

persecutions, the special and abiding glory of the
Japanese Church.

Before, however, we enter upon the history of these
persecutions, the mention of Taiko-Sama s name calls for
a brief explanation of the state of Japanese government
at that time. In our ecclesiastical histories this first per
secutor is always spoken of as " the Emperor Taico-
sama." The title is entirely erroneous. To explain
how the early missionaries fell into this error, it will be
necessary to refer to a much earlier period of Japanese
history. The series of the Emperors (or " Mikados ") of
Japan go back in an unbroken line from our own day
to the founder of the dynasty, Jimmu, who appears to
have reigned from 660 to 585 B.C. But at the close of the
twelfth century of our era the all-powerful Minister
Yoritomo succeeded in establishing the curious system of
government known as the Shogunate, which endured till
so recent a date as 1868. This system resembles nothing
so much as that of " the mayors of the palace " under the
later Merovingian kings. The " Shogun "* was Com-
mander-in-Chief of the forces, and also Viceregent of the
Empire. And though for long periods he was actually
the de facto ruler, still, during the whole eight centuries
of the Shogunate this potentate always scrupulously
observed the outward show of reverence for, and absolute
dependence upon, the Emperor, whose humble servant
he professed to be, and whose commission he always
received for the performance of his duties. This curious
form of government is described with fair accuracy in
the memoir on Japan drawn up by Paul Anjiro, with the
peculiarity that he styles the Emperor " Voo " and the
Shogun " Goxo " words of which we have not seen an
explanation anywhere, f Yet the early Jesuit mission-

* The name was long known in Europe under the quasi-
Chinese form, " Tycoon."

f Perhaps " Voo " may be meant for the Japanese word
"Wau," ruler or sovereign, and "Ten-wau," heavenly King, is
actually a title of the Mikado. But " Gossiyo " (literally, exalted
place) is also one of the titles of the Emperor himself.

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 309

aries seem to be quite oblivious of the existence of the
Mikados, or Emperors, whose names never appear in the
acts of the ancient Church of Japan.

The famous Taiko-Sama (literally, " Lord Taiko ") was
in reality the Prime Minister, Commander-in- Chief, and
Viceregent, known in Japanese history as Hideyoshi.
He was not Emperor, and never obtained even the
exalted title of Shogun, but was content with the lower
one of " Kwambaku," though his power was none the
less absolute. His predecessor in power, of whom we
have spoken above, the scarcely less celebrated Nobu-
naga, like himself, held the authority without enjoying
the title of Shogun.

In 1585 Hideyoshi, after a brief period of confusion,
became the virtual ruler of Japan. At first he does not
seem to have been hostile to the Christians, but his
sentiments gradually underwent a change. Various
reasons have been assigned for his development into a
persecutor. Prominent among these must have been
the influence of the bonzes, who doubtless did their best
to arouse his suspicions against the foreigners. He was,
indeed, already inclined to look upon the Jesuits as
secret envoys of the King of Portugal. But whatever
dislike to Christianity had been growing up in his mind
was fanned to a flame by the firmness and constancy of
certain Christian maidens who refused to yield to his
lustful passions, and preferred death to sin. The first
step towards persecution was Taiko-Sama s edict of 1587.
All " foreign religious teachers " were commanded to
quit Japan within twenty days under pain of death. The
Jesuit Fathers thereupon withdrew to Nagasaki, where it
would appear they were allowed to devote themselves to
the spiritual wants of the Europeans. Yet so far from
these measures checking the growth of Christianity, not
only did the Japanese converts remain staunch in their
faith, but it is calculated that during the next few years
over 60,000 more were added to the fold. Meanwhile
new elements were introduced.

310 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Much has been made by Protestant writers of the
mutual jealousies of the Jesuits and the other Orders.
A word must therefore be here said upon this subject.

It appears that in 1485 Pope Gregory XIII. issued a
brief giving to the Society of Jesus the exclusive charge
of the Japanese missions, as, indeed, it had well merited
by its extraordinary successes. The Spanish Govern
ment viewed with a jealous eye whatever secured the
monopoly of the Portuguese in the country ; and the
governor of the Philippines soon after despatched an
embassy to Hideyoshi, seeking to obtain permission to
trade at some of the Japanese ports, and with the em
bassy he sent four Franciscans, who were thus indirectly
permitted to establish themselves in Kyoto and Naga
saki (1593). Taiko-Sama at first seemed favourably
disposed to these Franciscans, and they soon took the
opportunity of publicly preaching the Gospel, which they
did with great success. This activity, combined with
the mischievous gossip of a Portuguese (or Spanish*)
sea-captain, seems to have roused Taiko-Sama to fury.
The imprudent fellow boasted that the King of Spain
had sent his own missionaries into Japan in order to pave
the way to a future conquest of the islands. Nothing
more was required to give the signal for a cruel persecu
tion. The death-penalty was decreed against all the
Christian preachers. The first fruits of the glorious
Japanese army of martyrs were the twenty-six who were
crucified at Nagasaki on February 5, 1597. They
numbered six Franciscan Fathers, including the superior,
Fr. Peter Baptist, fifteen Japanese tertiaries of the same
Order, three Japanese Jesuits, and two servants. At
the thrilling scene of this martyrdom, which has been too

* The accounts are contradictory, as is also the chronology of
these events. I have followed the valuable " Compendium
Historise Ecclesiasticae," published at Pulo-Pinang (Straits
Settlements), 1885, which differs considerably in the order of
its narrative from Mr. D. Murray (" Japan," in " The Story
off the Nations " series ; London : Fisher Unwin, 1894), whose
dates appear to me to be hopelessly confused.

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 311

often told to allow of repetition here, was present the
first Bishop who had yet set foot on Japanese soil. This
was Pedro Martinez, S.J., appointed Bishop of Japan by
Sixtus V., whose singular privilege it was to transmit to
Rome the acts of the Proto-martyrs, of which he himself
had been an eye-witness.

It is only fair to remark here that some of the responsi
bility for the persecution appears to be due to the action
of the converted Japanese princes, who, not content with
embracing the Catholic faith, seem to have been only
too ready to force it upon their subjects, and to pose as
regular persecutors of Buddhism. Those were not days
when " toleration " was understood in any country ; but
it would really appear that this untimely zeal of some of
these princes reacted disastrously upon the pagan rulers.

Taiko-Sama, or Hideyoshi, died in 1598. After some
years of civil war, the power passed into the hands of a
man scarcely less able than himself, leyasu, in whom the
office of Shogun (in abeyance since 1573) was restored,
and who founded the Tokugawa dynasty, or Shogunate.
A period of comparative peace and prosperity for the
Japanese Church now ensued. Bishop Luiz Serqueyra,
S.J., was able greatly to console and confirm his flock,
which he ruled peacefully till 1614. leyasu even received
the Bishop with a certain degree of favour in 1606 at
Kyoto, and the following year the Provincial of the
Jesuits. About the same time Dominican and Augus-
tinian Fathers began to arrive and swell the ranks of
the missioners. At the beginning of the seventeenth
century the number of Japanese Christians is said to have
risen to 1,800,000. But the peace was to be of short
duration ; it was but the prelude to one of the most
awful persecutions ever recorded in the history of the
Church.

Even during the period just referred to a certain
amount of local persecution of the Christians was going
on, especially in the principality of Fingo (Higo), where
several martyrs suffered. But in 1617 the persecution

312 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

became general, and for twenty years it endured with a
violence surpassing that of Nero. It is a lamentable fact
that much of the responsibility of this terrible persecu
tion must be laid at the door of the Dutch Protestants,
who, as well as the English, at this time began to trade
largely with Japan. National jealousy of the Portuguese
and Spanish, as well as religious hatred, were rife at the
time, and there is only too strong evidence to believe that
the new-comers did much to poison the mind of the
Shogun against the Catholics. Mr. Murray thinks that
leyasu had also been enraged by the solemn celebration
of the beatification of Ignatius Loyola (1609) by public
processions of the Bishop and all the religious orders
through Nagasaki, in spite of a " warning proclamation "
issued in 1606. But this was long years before the out
burst of the persecution ; the actual edict for the extirpa
tion of Christianity to secure the safety of the empire
was issued in 1614. All members of religious orders,
whether native or European, were to be expelled the
country, the churches which had been erected were to
be pulled down, and Japanese converts were to be com
pelled to renounce their faith. Some 300 persons were
shipped from Japan on October 25, but eighteen Jesuit
Fathers and nine lay-brothers escaped and lay concealed.
Among other exiles was the powerful noble Takeyama,
known in the Christian annals as Justus Ucondono. He
was one of those converted princes, and is accused of
having carried out a system of persecution against the
Buddhists in his territory of Akashi. But whatever
misguided zeal he may have shown in that matter, he
certainly set a bright example of personal heroism in the
hour of trial. He stimulated his fellow-Christians by his
constancy in the Faith, and his readiness to forego all
honours and dignities in its defence. Already banished,
in Taiko-Sama s reign, he was now deported to the Philip
pines, where he died of a painful sickness in 1615.

The new edict was carried out with ruthless severity.
A special department, entitled " The Christian Inquiry,"

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 313

was instituted for the purpose of searching out Christians
and forcing them to apostasy. Priests and laity were
hunted down ; large rewards were offered for information
against Christians in every rank of life ; a special scale
was published for the betrayal of parents by their
children, and of children by their parents. leyasu died
in 1616, just at the beginning of the persecution, but it
was continued with relentless fury by his son and suc
cessor. History has but one verdict upon the diabolic
atrocity of the persecution. " One may search the grim
history of early Christian martyrology," writes the
author of " The Conquests of the Cross," published by
Messrs. Cassell, " without finding anything to surpass the
heroism of the Roman Catholic martyrs of Japan.
Burnt on stakes made of crosses, torn limb from limb,
buried alive, they yet refused to recant." "It has never
been surpassed," says Mr. D. Murray of this persecution,
" for cruelty and brutality on the part of the persecutors,
or for courage and constancy on the part of those who
suffered."* Mr. Gubbins, in the Japanese Asiatic
Society s Transactions, after detailing some of the more
barbarous tortures inflicted, adds : " Let it not be sup
posed that we have drawn on the Jesuit accounts solely
for this information. An examination of the Japanese
records will show that the case is not overstated."

Painful as is the subject, some record must be made of
what these heroic confessors of the faith had to undergo.

" We read," says the last-quoted writer, " of their
being hurled from the tops of precipices, of their being
buried alive, of their being torn asunder by oxen, of their
being tied up in rice-bags, which were heaped up together,
and of the pile thus formed being set on fire. Others
were tortured before death by the insertion of sharp
spikes under the nails of their hands and feet, while some
poor wretches, by a refinement of horrid cruelty, were
shut up in cages and there left to starve with food before
their eyes."

* " Japan."

314 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Specially awful were the torments inflicted in the caves
of Un-gen (or On-sen) between Nagasaki and Shimabara.
Here some were plunged into the boiling sulphur-springs,
others suffocated by the fumes, some forced to drink
enormous quantities of water, and then, like Margaret
Clitheroe, pressed to death beneath crushing weights.
But of all the tortures the most terrible was that known
as " the Fosse," or suspension head downwards into a
pit, the martyr hanging by a rope fastened to the feet
and attached to a projecting post. The suffering was
excruciating, blood exuding from the mouth and nostrils,
and the pressure on the brain being almost unendurable.
Yet the victim usually survived eight or nine days ! We
can hardly be surprised that many succumbed under the
trial, and that a number fell away into apostasy. Yet
what were they compared with the glorious army of
martyrs, including women and children, mostly natives,
who triumphed and won their crown ? Statistics alone
are capable of giving an idea of the terrible character of
the persecution. It is reckoned that over 1,000 religious
of the four orders Jesuits, Franciscans, Dominicans,
and Augustinians shed their blood for the faith during
its course, whilst the number of native Japanese lay-folk
who perished exceeded 200,000 ! " Since the Apostolic
times no grander spectacle has been exhibited to the
Christian world ; it embraced episodes beautiful enough
to delight the angels, and refinements of wickedness
sufficient to excite the jealousy of demons."*

Everybody has heard of the trampling on the cross
which Europeans were required to perform to save their
lives. This test was known to the Japanese as e-fumi,
and was carried out under the direction of an officer,
styled Kirishitan Bugyo, or " Christian Inquisitor."
Specimens of the metal trampling-plates upon which the
crucifix was engraved made, too, from the metal ob
tained from the Christian altars are still to be seen in

* Louvet, "Les Missions Catholiques an XIX me Stecle," Paris,
1895. P- 235.

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 315

the Uyeno Museum in Tokyo. The Dutch made no
difficulty in submitting to the test, and for the sake of
trade privileges were content several times a year to
trample upon the figure of Him whom they professed to
worship as their Saviour.

The last scene in this terrible tragedy was the revolt
in the principality of Arima in 1638. One can hardly
wonder, perhaps, at the Christians being driven to
desperation by their twenty years persecution. Yet
Mr. Murray points out that it is but justice to remember
that this rebellion was not due exclusively to the Chris
tians, but that it was probably originated by other
causes namely, the misgovernment and senseless
cruelty of two successive daimyos of Arima, whose
tyranny drove the farmers of Arima and Amakusa to
open revolt.* Then it was that the Christians rose en
masse in the province to swell the ranks of the insurgents,
the total number amounting, it is said, to 40,000. Then
came the long siege of the strong position of Shimabara.
It will be remembered that the Dutch under Koecke-
backer, on this occasion, acceded to the request of the
Government, and lent their powder and cannon to the
besiegers. Dr. Geerts has written a defence of Koecke-
backer s action in the Japan Asiatic Society s Trans
actions, and thinks he could not help doing what he did,
and that any European would have done the same in
the same position. Finally, Shimabara was carried by
assault after a siege of 102 days, and a general massacre
ensued. We have Koeckebacker s own authority that
of the 40,000, young and old, all, except one, were
slaughtered. From that moment Christianity appeared
to be extinct in Japan. The last Bishop of the ancient
Church of Japan, Luis Sotelo, O.S.F., had perished,
having been burnt alive in 1624. A few scattered
remnants yet remained. Edicts continued to be issued
against the pestilent sect of the Christians.

" For more than two hundred years notice-boards
* " Japan," pp. 257-260.

316 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

stood beside highways, ferries, and mountain passes,
containing among other prohibitions the following : So
long as the sun shall warm the earth, let no Christian be
so bold as to come to Japan ; and let all know that the
King of Spain himself, or the Christian s God, or the
Great God of all, if He violate this commandment, shall
pay for it with His head. "*

So the Church, which at the beginning of the century
counted 1,800,000 souls, appeared by its close to be
absolutely extinct. A silence of death settled down
upon it. We hear, indeed, of an Italian Jesuit, Fr, John
Baptist Sidotti, reaching the shores of Japan in 1709 ;
but he was immediately captured and thrust into prison,
where he soon perished. He was the last Jesuit who has
ever trodden the Japanese soil. After his death dark
ness, black as night, spread over the scene, for it must be
remembered that not only was Christianity (apparently)
exterminated, but all intercourse with foreigners, even
for trade, was abruptly broken off, the only partial ex
ception being in favour of the Chinese and Dutch.

Before leaving the subject of the ancient Church of
Japan, it would seem but justice to record one more of
its titles to glory, though, indeed, a minor one. We
refer to the labours of the early missioners in behalf of
philology and literature. Protestant writers have re
corded with astonishment the fact that, whilst the Dutch,
favoured as they were by the Japanese Government, did
nothing in the cause of science, it is to the Catholic
missioners, in spite of the terrible times of persecution,
that Europe owes the earliest works relating to the
Japanese language and literature. Thus the Dutch
Orientalist Hoffmann, writing in the Journal of the
German Oriental Society (vol. xii., pp. 443 et seq.), says :

" It cannot but excite just surprise, as Adelung has
already remarked with disapprobation, that the Dutch,
whether merely from lack of interest or from petty

* See Cobbold, " Religion in Japan/ p. 94 (London : S.P.C.K.,
1894).

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 317

motives of selfishness, have waited until the most recent
times before publishing anything of value concerning the
language and literature of Japan. And yet they had
every opportunity to do so. ... Holland cannot easily
allege any serious excuse for not taking the task earlier
in hand. They had only to continue building upon a
ground already prepared for them by the Portuguese in
a highly commendable manner, as was always the case,
and bequeathed by them to their successors in Japan,
who were the Dutch themselves. ... To whom, then,
are we indebted for the first scientific knowledge of the
Japanese language ? To the Dutch ? Oh no ! To
Portuguese missioners like Alvarez, Rodriguez, and
Collado, who had already published their Japanese
grammars and dictionaries at the close of the sixteenth
and beginning of the seventeenth centuries."*

The above-mentioned Joao Rodriguez, S.J., arrived
in Japan in 1583, and under his directions a series of
important publications appeared between 1590 and 1610.
In 1595 there was printed in the Jesuit College at
Amakusa the now rare Portuguese-Latin-Japanese
Dictionary, occupying 906 quarto pages, and of remark
able completeness. In 1603 followed a Japanese-
Portuguese Dictionary. In 1604 Fr. Rodriguez s
Japanese Grammar was printed at Nagasaki. The
Dominicans rivalled the Jesuits in their literary zeal.
The above-named Diego Collado was a Dominican,
whose Dictionary and Grammar of the Japanese language
appeared in Rome in 1632. Three years before, the
Dominicans of Manila had printed a Spanish translation
of the Jesuit Dictionary. After Rodriguez, who died
in 1633, other missioners, such as Lopez and Sylva,
worked in the same field. For two centuries, moreover,
the reports of the Catholic missioners were the best
and almost the only sources of a knowledge of Japan
and the Japanese people. Fr. Froes, S.J., in the second

* See Jos. Dahlmann, S.J., " Die Sprachkunde und die Mis-
sionen," pp. 57, 58 (Freiburg: Herder, 1891).

3i8 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

half of the sixteenth century, deserves special mention
in this respect. According to Anushin, he was the first
European to speak of the curious primeval race of the
Ainos.

A number of religious works in the Japanese language
for the use of native Christians were compiled and
published by the Catholic missioners. Bishop Serqueyra,
whom we have spoken of above, composed a work on
moral theology. One of the Franciscan Fathers, known
as Diego de las Llagas, was a native Japanese, who,
besides translating the " Flos Sanctorum " into his
mother tongue, published also a Japanese Grammar and
a Spanish-Latin-Japanese Dictionary.

Special mention must also be made of the efforts of
the early missioners to accommodate the Japanese
language to the Roman alphabet a work which has
been taken up earnestly in our own time by the Romaji-
Kai, and which occupied a considerable share of the
attention of the Geneva International Congress of
Orientalists in 1894. In 1590 the Jesuit missioners
began to cast European type in Japan, and they elabo
rated a complete system of transcription in Roman
characters. Mr. Ernest Satow, the eminent Japanese
scholar, has published an interesting monograph, " The
Jesuit Mission Press in Japan, 1590-1610 " (London,
1888), in which a full account is given of the literary
labours of our missioners in this regard. Numerous
Japanese works, printed according to this system, exist
in the libraries of Europe.

II. THE "SECOND SPRING" IN JAPAN.

Though Catholicity in Japan was to all intents and
purposes extinct, the blood of so many martyrs was
not destined to be shed in vain. During the death-
silence of well-nigh two centuries, the Holy See did not
altogether forget this once so hopeful field of spiritual

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 319

harvest. Almost contemporaneously with the final
struggles of the Church of Japan, an entirely new move
ment was taking shape in Europe, leading eventually,
under the marvellous guidance of Providence, to the
erection of the Seminary of the Foreign Missions in
Paris, and the formation of the greatest foreign mis
sionary agency which the Church has ever seen, the
illustrious Societe des Missions fitrangeres. In so far as
the society can be said to have had " founders " for
in the literal sense of the word it had really no founder*
it is the two first Vicars Apostolic for the Far East
Mgr. Palm and Mgr. de la Motte Lambert, appointed
in 1658 by Pope Alexander VII. who have the nearest
claim to that title. The primary end of the new society
was the creation of a native clergy in the foreign mis
sionary countries confided to its charge ; the second one,
the preaching of the Gospel to the heathen. The first
centre of its work was in the kingdom of Siam, where a
general seminary for the training of native clergy was
erected in the old capital, Ayuthia. The earliest
countries of the Far East evangelized by the members
of the society were Annam (Cochin China), Tonkin, Siam,
and parts of China. Yet even at that early date the
eyes of the society seem to have been turned towards
the Forbidden Land, for two of its very first missionary
Bishops Mgr. Laneau and Mgr. Cice received in turn
the barren title of Vicars Apostolic of Japan. f Nothing
at all practical, however, was attempted till early on
in the last century. J Curiosity was awakened in 1831
by the shipwreck of a Japanese vessel on the shores of
the Philippines. Some twenty shipwrecked sailors were

* See on this subject Ad. Launay, " Histoire General e de la
Societe des Missions Etrangeres," torn. i. (Paris, 1894).

f Ad. Launay, p. 202.

% It is recorded in the Pulo-Pinang " Compendium Historiae
Ecclesiasticae," (1885), that at the close of the eighteenth century
a few men arrived in Cochin China saying they were Japanese
missionaries, and begging for some sacred vestments from the
Vicar Apostolic, to whom they made themselves known under
the greatest secrecy. The sequel does not appear (p. 127).

320 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

kindly received by the Spaniards, who were surprised
to find them wearing Christian medals, which they
appeared to reverence with superstitious veneration.
On inquiry, they said they had descended to them from
their ancestors. These descendants of the ancient
Christians were all instructed and baptized. Already
the Anglican Bible Society had been making efforts to
introduce their Bibles into Japan, but had met with little
success, and even been forced to fly.

To Gregory XVI. was reserved the glory of reopening
the sealed book of the history of the Japanese Church.
In 1832 he erected the Vicariate Apostolic of Korea,
attaching to it the Liu-Kiu (Ryu-Kyu, or Loo-Choo)
Islands, dependencies of Japan, in the hope that they
might become a gate opening into the Island Kingdom,
as indeed they proved to be. Some attempts not
altogether unsuccessful seem to have been made at this
time by the Societe des Missions ICtrangeres to send a
few Catechists into Japan, with what fruit we know not.
In 1838 we find Mgr. Imbert writing home, under date
November 22 : " Souvent il m arrive de tourner des
regards et presque d esperance vers les rives du Japon."
It was the two hundredth anniversary of the massacre
of Shimabara.

A new factor was about this time introduced into the
Japanese problem. The various governments of Europe
and the United States were making more and more
energetic efforts to bring about an opening-up of Japan
for commercial purposes. In the constant negotiations
for this end the various navies necessarily played a
leading part ; the real diplomatists were the admirals
and commodores, French or English, American or
Russian, who carried on the only possible communica
tions with the coy government of the Shoguns. The
French authorities were willing to associate their efforts
with those of the great French missionary society to
gain a footing in the Land of Promise. In 1844 the
French squadron was under the command of Rear-

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 321

Admiral Cecile. He consented to despatch the Alcmene,
under command of Fornier-Duplon, to the Liu-Kiu
Islands, having on board M. Forcade, a priest of the
Missions Etrangeres, and Augustine Ko, a native cate-
chist, who had already suffered as a confessor of the faith,
and subsequently became a priest. On the Feast of the
Patronage of St. Joseph, April 28, the capital of the
group, Nafa, was reached, and negotiations were at once
opened with the government of the petty king. The
end was that the two missioners were allowed to remain.
They soon found, however, that their condition was
little better than an honourable durance. They were
installed in a Buddhist monastery, but subjected to a
constant and harassing surveillance.

" I was barely allowed," wrote M. Forcade, " to take
a little exercise on the sand or mud by the seashore, and
even then I might not go out alone. I was surrounded
by the inevitable mandarins, preceded by satellites
armed with bamboos to strike the poor people and drive
off any passers-by, which was naturally calculated to
render me an object of odium."

The Japanese Government having got wind of these
proceedings, promptly demanded the missionary s head ;
but the Dutch resident at Deshimo, to his credit be it
said, interposed his good services, and perhaps respect
for the French squadron had its influence ; the danger
passed over. So two years went by, without any possi
bility of communicating with the natives even of Nafa.
In 1846 Pope Gregory XVI., to show his interest in the
work, nominated M. Forcade, Bishop of Samos and
Vicar Apostolic of Japan. The same year Admiral
Cecile called at Nafa with his squadron and endeavoured
to negotiate a treaty. The missioners were now allowed
to remain in the Tu-mai lamassery and to procure books
for the study of the language, and were relieved from
the vexatious surveillance they had hitherto endured.
Two new missionary priests, MM. Adnet and Leturdu,

21

322 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

arrived at the Liu-Kiu Islands, whilst Mgr. Forcade
went to France in the interests of his vicariate.

A gap of eight years now occurs in the progress of our
history. In 1854, under the pontificate of Pius IX.,
M. Collin, a missionary of Manchuria, was nominated
Prefect Apostolic of Japan, but died immediately after
his nomination. M. Libois, the new superior, sent out
three new missioners to the Liu-Kiu Islands under
M. Girard ; but their position was a very painful one,
and, like their predecessors, they were subjected to
incessant and vexatious surveillance. Once more the
French naval commandant, Admiral Guerin, interposed
his good offices, and a new treaty was made with the
king. The missioners were now allowed to buy some
land and build a house in the centre of the town. But
as regards evangelical work, all they could possibly
achieve was to baptize a few babies at the point of death,
and also a few old people.

In 1856 Admiral Laguerre, taking a missionary on
board, visited Nagasaki ; but all his efforts at friendly
negotiation were in vain. Other European nations had
in the interval been more successful. The real opening-
up of Japan is to be credited to the United States, for it
was Commodore Perry who, in 1853, conducted the first
successful negotiation with the Shogun s Government,
not without a very considerable and perhaps necessary
display of force, and the American treaty was ratified in
1854. Treaties followed with Great Britain in the same
year, Russia in 1855, and Holland in 1856, each pro
viding for the admission of traders to two Japanese ports.
France was still knocking at the door. In 1857 two
frigates, having two missionaries on board, touched at
Nagasaki, and one of the priests actually landed, but
was quickly obliged to beat a retreat.

At last, in 1858, Japan was finally opened to the
French, and as a consequence to the missioners of the
French Society. To Baron Gros belongs the credit of
negotiating the treaty at Yeddo (now called Tokyo),

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 323

signed on October 9. The ports of Yokohama, Naga
saki, and Hakodate were opened by this diplomatic key.
Religious liberty was allowed to foreigners, not yet to
natives. On November 28 M. Girard, now Pro- Vicar
Apostolic of Japan, writes in exulting strains to the
Central Council of the Society of the Propagation of the
Faith :

" After ten years of waiting and painful uncertainty,
about the future of a mission always so dear to us, to
behold the gates at length opened is an event in which
we cannot fail to see the direct intervention of Almighty
God. The treaty awards to the Minister Plenipotentiary
the right of travelling all over the empire. We hope
that one of us may be able to accompany him and seek
out the remnants of the ancient Christian settlements
said still to exist in Japan."*

Very little, however, could be done at first. Prudence
made caution absolutely necessary. Missionaries were
placed in each of the three treaty ports to attend to the
spiritual wants of European Catholics, and chapels were
erected at Yokohama and Nagasaki. That of the former
town was dedicated with considerable pomp on
January 12, 1861, and many Japanese, undeterred by
severe Government edicts, daily visited it out of curiosity.

We must now turn our eyes for a moment to Rome.
Already, as early as 1627, Pope Urban VIII. had per
mitted the Franciscans and Jesuits to celebrate yearly
an Office and Mass in honour of the martyrs of their
respective congregations who, as above narrated, had
been crucified at Nagasaki under Taiko-Sama in 1597.
Their cause pursued its course in Rome, and finally, on
Whit Sunday, 1862, Pius IX., surrounded by an extra
ordinary gathering of Catholic Bishops from all parts of
the world, had the consolation of solemnly proclaiming
the canonisation of these twenty-six first martyrs of
Japan.

What followed in Japan seemed like a visible answer
* Ad. Launay, p. 365.

21 2

324 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

to the honours thus so splendidly rendered to these
heroes of the faith. On February 19, 1865, the fine
Catholic church dedicated to the twenty-six martyrs was
opened at Nagasaki, the scene of their martyrdom.
This church had been built by M. Bernard Petit jean, a
native of the diocese of Autun, who, having joined the
Societe des Missions Etrangeres, had been sent out to
Japan in 1860. We must let this illustrious missionary,
whose name will be for ever indissolubly bound up with
the history of the Japanese Church, narrate the wondrous
sequel in his own oft-quoted words :

" Scarce a month had elapsed since the benediction of
the church at Nagasaki. On March 17, 1865, about
half-past twelve, some fifteen persons were standing at
the church door. Urged, no doubt, by my Angel
Guardian, I went up and opened the door. I had scarce
time to say a Pater when three women, between fifty and
sixty years of age, knelt down beside me, and said in a
low voice, placing their hand upon their heart :

" The hearts of all of us here do not differ from
yours.

" Indeed ! I exclaimed. Whence do you come ?

"They mentioned their village, adding: At home
everybody is the same as we are !

" Blessed be Thou, O my God ! for all the happiness
which filled my soul. What a compensation for five
years of barren ministry ! Scarce had our dear Japanese
opened their hearts to us than they displayed an amount
of trustfulness which contrasts strangely with the
behaviour of their pagan brethren. I was obliged to
answer all their questions, and to talk to them of
Deous Sama, Yaso Sama, and Santa Maria Sama, by
which names they designate God, Jesus Christ, and the
Blessed Virgin. The view of the statue of the Madonna
and Child recalled Christmas to them, which they said
they .had celebrated in the eleventh month.* They

* According to the old Japanese calendar, the year began with
our February.

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 325

asked me if we were not at the seventeenth day of the
Time of Sadness (i.e., Lent) ; nor was St. Joseph un
known to them ; they call him Yaso Samana yo fu,
the adoptive father of our Lord. In the midst of this
volley of questions footsteps were heard ; immediately
all dispersed. But as soon as the new-comers were
recognised all returned, laughing at their fright.

" They are people of our village, they said. They
have the same hearts as we have.

" However, we had to separate for fear of awakening
the suspicions of the officials, whose visit I feared. On
Maunday Thursday and Good Friday, April 13 and 14,
1,500 people visited the church of Nagasaki. The
presbytery was invaded ; the faithful took the oppor
tunity to satisfy their devotion before the crucifix and
the statues of Our Lady. During the early days of May
the missioners learnt of the existence of 2,500 Christians
scattered in the neighbourhood of the city. On May 15
there arrived delegates from an island not very far from
here. After a short interview we dismissed them,
detaining only the catechist and the leader of the pil
grimage. The catechist, named Peter, gave us the most
valuable information. Let me first say that his formula
for baptism does not differ at all from ours, and that he
pronounces it very distinctly. He declares that there
are many Christians left up and down all over Japan.
He cited in particular one place where there are over
1,000 Christian families. He then asked us about the
Great Chief of the Kingdom of Rome, whose name he
desired to know. When I told him that the Vicar of
Christ, the saintly Pope Pius IX., would be very happy
to learn the consoling news given us by himself and his
fellow-countrymen, he gave full expression to his joy.
Nevertheless, before leaving he wished to make quite
sure that we were the true successors of the ancient
missioners. Have you no children ? he asked timidly.

" You and all your brethren, Christian and heathens
of Japan, are all the children whom God has given us.

326 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

Other children we cannot have. The priest must, like
your first Apostles, remain all his life unmarried.

" At this reply Peter and his companion bent their
heads down to the ground and cried out : They are
celibate. Thank God ! "*

Next day an entire Christian village invited a visit from
the missioners. Two days later 600 more Christians
sent a deputation to Nagasaki. By June 8 the mis
sioners had learnt the existence of twenty-five " Chris
tianities," and seven " baptizers " were put into direct
relation with them.

" Thus (to quote M. Launay s admirable resume of
this marvellous episode), in spite of the absence of all
exterior help, without any sacraments except baptism
by the action of God in the first place, and in the next
by the faithful transmission in families of the teaching
and example of the Japanese Christians and martyrs of
the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the sacred fire
of the True Faith, or at least a still burning spark of this
fire, had remained concealed in a country tyrannized over
by a government the most despotic and the most hostile
to the Christian religion. All that was required was to
blow upon this spark and to rekindle its flame in order
to realise once more the wish expressed by our Saviour :
I am come to cast fire upon the earth, and what do I
desire but that it be enkindled ?

Such was the almost miraculous event of March 17,
1865, in honour of which Pius IX. established a feast,
with the rank of a greater double, to be celebrated for
ever in Japan under the title of "The Finding of the
Christians."

It was a graceful recognition of the part played by
Fr. Petit jean in this resurrection of the Japanese Church
that further prompted Pius IX. to nominate him the
following year (1866) Bishop of Myrophitus and Vicar
Apostolic of Japan.

* Ad. Launay, pp. 457-459.

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 327

One of the first acts of the new Bishop was to erect a
statue to " Our Lady of Japan " in 1867, and the same
year Pius IX. pronounced the beatification of 205 more
of the early Japanese martyrs, including both men and
women.

We cannot be astonished that, in spite of all precau
tions, the secret soon leaked out in Japan. Christianity
was still a proscribed religion, forbidden under pain of
death. No wonder the year 1867 saw the commence
ment of fresh attempts at persecution. In 1868 a fresh
edict was issued and displayed on the public notice-
boards, declaring : " The evil sect called Christian is
strictly prohibited. Suspicious persons should be re
ported to the proper officers, and rewards will be given."
One of the missioners, M. Laucaigne (afterwards Vicar
Apostolic), had a narrow escape of being arrested.
Sixty-five Christians of Urakami were actually seized.

This same year (1868) saw the great national revolu
tion, which entirely altered the system of government.
This is not the place to narrate this, the most important
political event which has occurred for seven centuries in
Japan. Suffice it to say that the upshot of the struggle
was the abolition of the Shogunate, established by
Yoritomo as far back as 1192, and the resumption of
supreme and undivided power by the real Emperor, the
Mikado, whose supremacy had been practically dormant
during all those long centuries. It was the still reigning
Mikado, Mutsuhito, then only sixteen years of age, under
whom this great revolution was effected. Strange to
say, this restoration of the Imperial power was coincident
with a recrudescence of persecution. Fresh imperial
edicts against Christians were published. Between
October, 1869, and January, 1870, 4,500 Christians were
deported from Urakami and the Goto Islands, the chief
centres of Catholicity. Pius IX. addressed to these con
fessors a letter of encouragement. In reply to remon
strances from the Powers, the Government of Tokyo in
a memorandum accused the missioners of fomenting

328 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

disorder. And it was a considerable time before the
Consuls could induce the Government to recall the
exiles, and withdraw the measures decreed against the
Christians.

The next few years are designated in the annual
reports of the missioners as a time of mingled persecu
tion and liberty. For, in spite of the expiring efforts of
hostility and repression, the growth of Catholicity and
the expansion of Catholic works went on very rapidly.
It was not until 1873 that all religious persecution ceased.
It is calculated that between 1868 and 1873 from 6,000
to 8,000 Christians were torn from their families, de
ported, and subjected to cruel tortures, so that nearly
2,000 died in prison.* On March 14, 1873, all the
Christian prisoners were set at liberty, though the
missioners were not yet allowed to penetrate into the
interior.

From this time forward the history of Catholicity in
Japan has been one of most gratifying progress. The
number of missionary priests sent out by the society
largely increased, rising from 3 in 1860 to 28 in 1880,
and to 98 in 1895. Nuns were introduced, belonging to
the two Societies of St. Paul of Chartres and of the Child
Jesus. The first religious women entered Japan in 1872,
and soon had several native postulants. The first native
nun (at least, in modern times), and also the first to die,
was Agatha Kataoka Fuku, in religion Sister Margaret,
the sister and daughter of martyrs, who herself died quite
young from the effects of the ill-usage she had endured
as a child in gaol, where she saw her father perish under
the blows of the executioner. In 1882 Sister Julia
(Maria Fuyu), and in 1885 Sister Mary (Melania Kustugi
Totu) were professed. These were the firstfruits of the
religious life in the new Church of Japan. There are
now a good number of native nuns, both professed and
postulants. A native clergy, too, has been created, the
first Japanese priest having been ordained in September,
* Lou vet, p. 238.

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 329

1883, and some thirty native priests are already at work.
" If," says Louvet, " in the hour of trial this heroic
Church, which was able with mere catechists to preserve
the faith, had had a native clergy, it is probable that
Japan would at the present day be wellnigh Christian."*

The ecclesiastical government of Japan has necessarily
developed to keep pace with this religious growth. In
1876 (June 3) Pope Pius IX. divided the vicariate of
Japan into two a north and a south vicariate. His
successor, Leo XIII., in 1888 (March 16), created a
third vicariate Central Japan out of that of South
Japan ; and in 1891 (April 17) divided that of North
Japan, erecting the new vicariate of Hakodate. The
preceding year, on the twenty-fifth anniversary of the
" Discovery of the Christian," the First Provincial Synod
of Japan was held at Nagasaki, close to the tomb of
Bishop Petitjean (who had died October 7, 1884), an d
in the very church where the wonderful event of
March 17, 1865, had taken place.

" Who could then have told Fr. Petitjean," wrote
his successor, Mgr. Jules Cousin, " that twenty-five years
later there would be assembled at the foot of the same
altar four Bishops, with over thirty missioners and native
priests, and that his first meeting with a few poor women
who were praying to Santa Maria would have had such
rapid and consoling results ?"|

At this synod was first announced the great and
crowning act long contemplated by Leo XIII. the
formal creation of the Japanese hierarchy. This was
effected by the Apostolic Letter " Non maius Nobis,"
dated June 15, 1891. In this interesting document the
Holy Father, after a brief but succinct summary of the
history of Catholicity in Japan from the time of St.
Francis Xavier down to our own day, refers in graceful
terms to the " courtesy of justice " of the present
Japanese Government towards Catholic missioners, and

* Louvet, p. 239.

f Illustrated Catholic Missions, vol. iv., p. 63.

330 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

especially to the interchange of amenities between the
Holy See and the Mikado. The latter had solemnly
received Mgr. Osouf in 1885 with an autograph letter
from Leo XIII., expressing the Pontiff s gratitude at the
benevolent disposition of the Japanese Government ;
and in his turn had deputed a diplomatist to Rome to
offer his Imperial congratulations on the Pope s sacer
dotal jubilee.*

The Pontiff then proceeds to create and delimit the
four sees. The Metropolitan See is fixed at Tokyo, " the
illustrious city which is the capital of the Empire and
the residence of the most serene Emperor," and is
bounded on the north by the provinces of Ichigo, Iwashiro
and Iwaki ; in the south it embraces the provinces of
lechizen and Owari, and extends to the shores of Lake
Biwa. It is thus a continuation of the old vicariate of
North Japan, minus that of Hakodate, which had been
detached only in the April of the same year.

Of the suffragan sees, that of Hakodate, like the
vicariate of the same name, embraces the whole of Japan
north of the archdiocese, with Yezo, the island of the
Ainus, and the Kurile Islands. The see of Nagasaki
occupies South Japan, in continuation of the old
vicariate, embracing the islands of Kyu-Shu, Hirado,
Goto, Chushima, the Liu-Kiu Isles, and several smaller
ones. All the rest, the former vicariate of Central Japan,
from Lake Biwa to the south of the main island of
Nippon, and including the island of Shikoku, forms the
diocese of Osaka. The former Vicars Apostolic now
became Bishops with territorial titles : Mgr. Osouf being
first Archbishop of Tokyo, and Metropolitan ; Mgr.
Cousin, Bishop of Nagasaki ; Mgr. Midon, Bishop of
Osaka ; and Mgr. Berlioz, Bishop of Hakodate.

* Two other indications of the changed dispositions of the
Mikado s Government deserve to be quoted here. In 1877, when
a fresh persecution threatened in Korea, and Mgr. Ridel, V.A.,
was arrested, the Japanese Government intervened in his favour.
On August n, 1884, an Imperial Decree disestablished Buddhism
and Shintoism, the State religions, and declared the bonzes to
be no longer State officials.

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 331

With the creation of the hierarchy, the Church of
Japan enters upon an entirely new era of her history.*

The following table gives a summary view of the
growth of the Japanese Church in this century :

Year.

Superiors.

Mis-
sioners.

Native
Clergy.

Churches
and
Chapels.

Schools.

Number !
of
Catholics. :

i860

i Prefect Apostolic

2

o

(none i

known)

IS/O

i Vicar Apostolic -

13

4

O

10,000

1880

2 Vicars Apostolic

28

80

60

23.989 i

1891

/i Archbishop \
\ 3 Bishops J

82

15

164

64

44.505 |

1904

/i Archbishop \
\4 Bishops J

119

29

165

84

68,336 ;

* We append in this footnote a " series episcoporum " of
Japan, taken from the Pulo-Pinang " Compendium," and not
easy to find elsewhere, and brought up to the present day :

I. Antonio Oviedo, S.J., Patriarch of Ethiopia ; appointed
" Bishop of Japan " by St. Pius V., but declined to accept.
II. Melchior Carnero, S.J., Bishop of Nicsea ; Coadjutor to
above, but died at Macao.

III. Sebastian Morales, S.J., Bishop of Japan under Sixtus V. ;

died at Mozambique on his way out.

IV. Pedro Martinez, S.J., Bishop of Japan, the first to land;

was present at the sufferings of the twenty-six martyrs.
V. Luiz Serqueyra, S.J., Coadjutor ; ruled till 1614.
VI. Didaco Valens, S. J., died at Macao on his way out.
VII. Luis Sotelo, O.S.F., Bishop of East and North Japan ;
reached Nagasaki 1622, arrested and burnt alive 1624.
VIII. Auguste Forcade, S.M.E., Bishop of Samos, and V.A.of Japan.
(After his death FF. Collin, Libois, and Girard, Superiors.)
IX. Bernard Petitjean, S.M.E., Bishop of Myrophitus and V.A.
of Japan, 1866; V.A. of South Japan, 1876; died 1884.
X. Joseph Laucaigne, S.M.E., Bishop of Apollonia, and
Auxiliary to preceding, 1873 . died 1885.

XI. Pierre M. Osouf, S.M.E., Bishop of Arsinoe, and V.A. of

North Japan, 1877 ; Archbishop of Tokyo, 1891.

XII. Jules A. Cousin, S.M.E., Bishop of Acmonia, and V.A. of

South Japan, 1885 ; Bishop of Nagasaki, 1891.

XIII. Felix M. Midon, S.M.E., Bishop of Oesaropolis, and V.A.

of Central Japan, 1 888; Bishop of Osaka, 1891; died 1893.

XIV. Alexandre Berlioz, S.M.E., Bishop of Kalinsda, V.A., and

then Bishop of Hakodate, 1891.

XV. Henri Vasselon, S.M.E., second Bishop of Osaka, 1894.
XVI. Jules Chatron, S.M.E., third Bishop of Osaka, 1896.
XVII. Pierre Mugabure, S.M.E., Bishop of Sagalasso and
Coadjutor of Tokyo, 1901.

332 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

III. THE FUTURE OF THE CHURCH IN JAPAN.

And the future ? The establishment of the Japanese
hierarchy may be very correctly regarded as the close of
one epoch and the opening of another. What are the
prospects of the Catholic Church in the Japan of the
twentieth century ?

To guide us in forming a probable estimate of the
outlook, we have the best possible sources of informa
tion : the views of the experienced missionary Bishops
who constitute the Japanese hierarchy, as contained in
their annual reports to the society which has sent them
forth to their evangelical labours. Let us then consult
the Compte Rendu des Travaux, published in 1894 and
since.

These reports have undoubtedly their consoling side.
The number of Catholics in 1904 was 68,336 a growth
of 23,831 since 1891 (see preceding table). During the
twelve months the number of adult pagans converted
and baptized had been 2,105 ; the number of children
of Christian parents baptized (representing the natural
growth of the Church), 1,747. Works of education and
charity show a gratifying increase. Special mention is
made of the two excellent leper asylums of Gotemba
and Kumamoto. Leprosy is still a terrible scourge of
the Japanese Archipelago, and very heartrending are
the accounts published from time to time by our Catholic
missioners, especially FF. Vigroux and Corre, in the
pages of Illustrated Catholic Missions* of the wretched
and abandoned victims of this fell disorder. The work
among the lepers will doubtless bring with it many
spiritual blessings on our missionary work, and must
produce a great effect on the native mind. It is con
soling, again, to read of the primitive fervour which still
characterizes the Christians of the Goto Islands, " the
heritage of the ancient Church of Japan "; of the living

* See especially vol. iv., p. 176 ; vol. vi., p. 48 ; vol. vii.,
p. 103 ; vol. ix., pp. 70, 135.

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 333

zeal and self-denying labours of the catechists of
Oshima ; and of the great hopes entertained of the
future conversion of the Ainus, whom Fr. Rousseau finds
" docile, sympathetic, and humble," their chief defects
being excessive timidity, and, alas ! the love of intoxi
cating drink.

It is a gratifying fact that the patriotic, and often
heroic, conduct of Catholic sailors, soldiers and officers
during the great Chinese and Russian wars of the past
ten years has largely increased the credit of, and the
respect for, Catholicity in the Japanese mind.

But it is useless to deny that there are many dark
clouds looming over the future of Japanese Catholicity.
The era of actual persecution is over,* but it may well
be doubted whether the dangers that seem to threaten
are not more formidable than the sword and fire of the
persecutor. The Bishops reports are full of these perils.
The Archbishop of Tokyo enumerates four agencies at
work which impede the advance of Catholicity ; these
are, the active hostility of the bonzes, the antagonism of
the sects, political agitation and the growing dislike of
foreigners, and chiefly the anti-Catholic press. Two of
these agencies deserve a word of fuller explanation.
Since Japan was opened to foreign intercourse, a very
large number of missions have been founded by various
European and American sects. The best account of
these will be found in Mr. Cobbold s extremely interest
ing little book, " Religion in Japan," which deserves
commendation for its general fairness and for the appre
ciative manner in which it treats our Catholic missions,
both ancient and modern. The Russian Church pursues
an active propaganda, has a fine Cathedral at Tokyo,
and claims a total membership of over 20,000, divided
into^2 19! congregations. The number of adult baptisms

* Strangely enough, however, even at the present day, " our
missionaries are allowed to reside in the interior of Japan only
onCsuffrance and as travellers. The passports issued for this
purpose have to be renewed half-yearly " (" Compte Rendu des
Travaux," p. 94).

334 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

for 1892 is given as 952 ; and the proximity of Russian
Asia to Japan is highly favourable to this mission. The
various Protestant missions are so numerous as to be
confusing. The Americans were first in the field, having
begun work in 1859. Three of these missions viz.,
those of the American Episcopal Church, the Church of
England, and the English Church in Canada, have
formed a kind of alliance, holding biennial synods, under
the general title of " Nippon Sei Kokwai," or "Church
of Japan." The total membership of this group is
stated to be 4,300, of whom 3,000 belong to the Anglican
Church (represented by both the Church Missionary
Society and the Society for the Promotion of the Gospel).
There are three or four American and English Bishops.
Another amalgamation of religious bodies is that entitled
" The Church of Christ in Japan," made up of several
American sects and the United Presbyterians of Scot
land, claiming a membership of 11,190. Then there are
the " Kumi-ai Churches " i.e., the Congregational] sts
with a total of 10,700. Lastly, there are a number of
disjecta membra, such as American and Canadian
Methodists, Baptists, Swiss Protestants, American
Friends, Scandinavian Church, and Unitarians, totalling
about 8,640. The sum total of members of the Greek
Church and Protestant sects of all denominations is now
reckoned at over 66,000.

Now, even if all these discordant sects displayed no
hostility to the work of the Catholic Church, it cannot
be doubted that the spectacle of the disintegration of
the Christian name and the contradictory nature of their
respective teachings must produce the worst possible
effect upon the keen and intelligent mind of the Japanese,
and must afford a powerful argument to the bonzes in
comparing Christianity unfavourably with Buddhism ;
nor are they slow to avail themselves of so formidable
a weapon. Miss Bickers teth (daughter of an Anglican
Bishop), in her book " Japan as we saw It " (1893),
quoted by Mr. Cobbold, does not fail to remark this :

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 335

" It was impossible not to be struck," she says, " with
the present complication of religious matters in the
country as compared with the days of Xavier. . . . The
divisions of Christendom are nowhere more evident than
in its foreign missions to an intellectual people like
the Japanese. The Greek, the Roman, the Anglican
Churches, the endless splits of Nonconformity, must
and do present to the Japanese mind a bewildering
selection of possibilities in religious truth/

In connection with this, Mr. Cobbold comments
strongly on the disastrous " trimming " in formulae,
chiefly with reference to the Divinity of Christ, practised
by some of the Nonconformist sects, and which he calls
" full of painful significance."* The same writer per
ceives that the married missionary of the sects is
specially unsuited to Japan, as to other Eastern fields, -f
and certainly cannot tend to their Christianisation. It
will be evident, therefore, that the advent of all these
sects has rendered the work of the Catholic missionaries
far more arduous and precarious.

An anti-Catholic press is quite a new element of diffi
culty to cope with :

" The great means," writes M. Ligneul " the prin
cipal means employed by the sectaries and by enemies
of all kinds and all shades against the propagation of
Christianity is the press. The press is nowadays, at least
as much as in Europe, the real power. Everybody reads,
and each one, especially since the establishment of con
stitutional government, pretends more than ever before
to judge of everything for himself." J

Some remarkable statistics regarding the Japanese
press are given by Archbishop Osouf. In 1892 the
number of books published in Japan was 20,647, of
which 7,334 were new works, and the rest translations
or re-editions. Of newspapers there were 792, and of
these 69 were religious, issuing a total of 1,837,000

* Cobbold, p. 1 06. f Ibid., p. in

J Compte Rendu, p. 38.

336 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

numbers. In 1902 the numbers of publications on
religious subjects had risen to 1,134. The largest pro
portion of these works and papers were Buddhist. The
Protestants have 22 papers or other periodicals, and large
numbers of books ; the catalogues of two Tokyo book
sellers mention 600 of all sizes and prices. The Russians
issue a fortnightly periodical of 32 pages. And the
Catholics ? For some time they issued a small Catholic
paper of only 18 pages ; this failed, but at present there
are two Catholic monthly periodicals, one of 50 pages
edited by Fr. Maeda, a native Japanese, the other by
Fr. Lemoine. It appears to us that what is most
urgently needed is a Japanese Catholic Truth Society !

The great event of 1893 was the issue of an anti-
Christian work by one Inoue Tetsujiro, a professor of the
Imperial University, who had studied at the University
of Berlin, whence he returned with the degree of Ph.D.
and a knowledge of three European languages. It has
been his endeavour to rehabilitate Buddhist pantheism
by clothing it in the garb of German rationalistic philo
sophy. The book is written in a very attractive, almost
irresistible, style ; the high reputation of its author for
learning secured him at once a hearing, and in a few
weeks the book had an immense success. Its main
thesis is that Christianity is contrary to the welfare of
the Japanese State and family. The true religion of
Japan is patriotism. Christianity is an ti- Japanese.
The writer dishes up all kinds of old arguments : the
decadence of Catholic nations in Europe, and the con
tempt of the educated classes for Catholicism ; the
alleged incompatibility of its teaching, with the results
of experimental science ; the intellectual inferiority of
the clergy ; the moral corruption of Europe, in spite of
its profession of Christianity ; the absence of patriotic
teaching in the Gospel, the apparent opposition of some
of its doctrines to family duties ; even the Inquisition
and Galileo find their place among the two hundred
objections piled up together with little or no attempt at

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 337

proof, but in eloquent language, and all leading to the
same conclusion " Christianity is contrary to the wel
fare of country and home." In the present disposition
of the Japanese mind one can easily understand the
phenomenal success of this book, which was soon
followed by two others of a like nature, and doubtless
others will yet appear. The missioner quoted above
M. Ligneul -did not delay in producing a reply to this
pernicious work, the refutation of which is by no means
difficult. The first volume of this reply was already
printed, and great good was anticipated from its appear
ance. According to Japanese law, however, before a
book can be issued from the press, two copies must be
deposited at the Ministry of the Interior. This was done
by M. Ligneul, and the very day before his book was to
be published a Ministerial decree prohibited its issue on
the ground that " it menaced the public peace !" The
impression produced was extremely painful. " On the
one hand," writes the Archbishop, " we see Christianity
publicly and very violently attacked, on the other we are
placed in the impossibility of publishing a reply. It is
very hard ! However," his Grace adds, " there is hope
that some good may yet result." Nearly all the news
papers published the official censure. The book of
M. Ligneul has thereby already gained a certain notoriety,
and is being widely asked for.

In his report for 1903, the Archbishop has some
further information on this subject. He writes :

" It would be impossible to give an idea of the deluge
of books, newspapers, reviews, and publications of all
sorts which inundate Japan. To continue the struggle
in this field without losing courage one must have an
invincible confidence in the power of truth. Fr. Drouart,
who carries on with equal zeal the care of his district
and the composition of controversial works, has solved,
in an excellent book, thirty of the most serious objections
against God, Jesus Christ, and the Church. Fr. Steichen
has issued an important work (in both French and

22

338 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

English) The Christian Daimyos : a Century of Re
ligious and Political History in Japan (1549-1650).
His work is a source of light for Japanese history itself,
as well as for that of the Church in Japan. M. Ligneul,
the indefatigable apostle of religious controversy, and
his skilful collaborator, Fr. Maeda, have published,
sometimes separately, sometimes in conjunction, about
a pamphlet a month on different subjects, generally on
burning questions of the day. An influential Tokyo
newspaper lately tendered well-deserved homage to
M. Ligneul. After mentioning several of his publica
tions, the writer of the article added : As a contro
versialist, M. Ligneul has probably never had his equal
in the Christian Church in Japan. Among the objec
tions urged against Christianity there are very few
indeed which he has not answered with great com
petence/ "

But there is a factor in the life and development of the
Japanese nation deeper than any of those yet referred
to, and which in the long-run threatens to be more
dangerous to the Church than any other. This is the
ever-growing spirit of materialism and indifferent ism,
lamented by almost every one of the missioners.

Our readers will scarce need to be reminded of the
extraordinary and probably unprecedented change which
has come over the political and social life of Japan during
the reign of the present Mikado. That change can best
be expressed as the " Europeanization " of Japan.
Western civilization has been taken over en bloc, and,
without any transition, the quaint Japan of the Shoguns
and the daimyos, with their strange costumes, grotesque
armour, and half -barbarous system of feudal aristocracy,
has been transformed into a modern constitutional
kingdom, with its Houses of Parliament and responsible
Ministry, its latest Parisian or London fashions, its rail
ways, telegraphs, bicycles, machinery, universities,
learned societies, newspapers, and all the other para
phernalia of our so-called " civilization." The late war

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 339

has shown how in the matter of armaments and military
organization, in ironclads, torpedo-boats, and the whole
equipment of army and navy, Japan can now claim to
rank among the Great Powers of the day. Unfortu
nately, this civilization thus suddenly thrust upon the
Japanese people is of a purely materialistic nature. As
is the case in India, European education, the spirit of
" corrosive criticism," has shattered the belief in the
ancient religions of the country, whose puerilities and
superstitions have become only too apparent to more
enlightened minds, and have substituted no form of
religious belief in their place. The result is a blank
scepticism, a purely negative rationalism. This result
is well expressed in a passage quoted by Mr. Cobbold :

" A dull apathy as regards religion has settled down
upon the educated classes of Japan. The gods of
heathenism have crumbled to nothing before modern
science and civilization, and the glimmer of light and
truth to which they pointed has gone as well."*

This is the cry of all the missioners, as the following
extracts from the Compte Rendu will show :

" The characteristic note of the period we are passing
through," writes M. Bulet, " is, if I am not mistaken, a
real religious indifference, which is more difficult to over
come than the ancient hostility which made martyrs."

The Bishop of Nagasaki, Mgr. Cousin, enumerates as
the chief obstacle to be encountered " the ever-growing
indifference of the population in regard to religious
matters. This indifference is produced by books,
newspapers, the official education, the thirst for material
well-being, for which the extension of commerce and
relations with the outer world have opened up new
resources."

The Bishop of Osaka enumerates the difficulties of his

ministry, and among them " the general spirit of the

people a spirit which is intelligent, open, supple, but

completely absorbed by politics and the fever of material

* " Religion in Japan," p. 109.

22 2

340 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

progress." At Miyazu, we read, " the opening of a
commercial port and that of a naval port at Maizuru
have so preoccupied men s minds that they can find
neither time nor disposition to study a foreign religion."

The sad results of this state of things are visible on
every page of the reports. There is an actual slackening
in the tide of conversions, and a falling off among the
Christians themselves. " Nearly all the missionaries,"
reports Archbishop Osouf, " complain of a want in their
Christians, the absence of zeal to propagate their religion
around them." M. Steichen, writing of his district of
Shizuoka, declares :

" This year has been the most painful of my life. To
judge by the number of baptisms I have to report, one
might doubt of the zeal of my five catechists. Nothing
could be more unjust. ... St. Paul (2 Tim. iv.) has
well described the state of my district : There shall be
a time when they will not endure sound doctrine, but
will turn away their hearing from the truth, and will be
turned into fables.

At Matsumoto M. Drouart deplores the stationary
state of Christianity, in spite of the labours of his
predecessors and himself. In the archdiocese, the
boarding-school for girls, in spite of the unbounded
devotedness of the nuns, does not increase ; the number
of elementary schools and pupils has slightly decreased.
With the consoling exception of Oshima, the Bishop of
Nagasaki does not foresee anywhere in his diocese any
considerable movement of conversions.

" If we look " (writes F. Claudius Ferrand) " at the
Japan of to-day, really, does it not seem that she goes
farther away from the Catholic truth, as she grows in
power and advances in the road of progress ? The
high classes of Japanese society, both those which
govern and those which teach, do they not openly pro
fess the most absolute rationalism ? Whoever elevates
himself above the vulgar herd, whether by fame or
science, whether by social position or by riches, does

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 341

he not make it a title of glory to publicly parade his
contempt of all religion. Is not atheism officially
taught in the schools, patronized by the press, preached
by the so-called scholars and philosophers who keep
schools ? Does it not seem that it is the fashion and
forms an essential part of the programme followed by
those who direct New Japan ? Yes, certainly, we must
admit that it is outside of all Christian thought, not
to say against Him who effects this progress which
astonishes the world."

It will be interesting, before concluding, to cite the
views, no longer of a European observer, but of a native
Catholic Japanese. Writing to Father Claudius Ferrand,
the founder of the " Geshikuya," a Catholic hostel
for Japanese students frequenting the university and
professional schools in the capital, this native priest,
Father Maeda Choto, says :

" I am a Catholic priest and Japanese. I cannot be indifferent,
I must not be, in regard to all that concerns our religion and
my country. . . .

"Leibnitz has said: I have always thought that we could
reform mankind if we reformed the education of youths. In
fact the young men of to-day are the men of to-morrow ; good
or bad they will mostly be what their education has made them.
Also everyone says and repeats it : Youth, here is the future,
here is the hope. It is true, but perhaps also ruin in preparation.
This is why for thirty years the activity of the Japanese has
turned specially towards education. It is by education that all
the changes of this country have been brought about. All who
have been able to profit of this means have done so to instil into
the new generation the spirit and the ideas that they wished to
give them. The Protestants in particular have used it more
than any of the others. By teaching under all its forms, all its
degrees, they have exercised over all the country an influence
hard to believe. Among the men of the press, before the public
eye, in public schools, in politics, the first and the most remark
able have come from their schools or at least have been brought
up after their principles. By the men that Protestantism has
formed it is nearly in a position to govern all intellects.

" And in our Catholic Church ? There have been for a long time
works of faith and of charity of all kinds. For orphans, boys
and girls, for young women, for the sick, for the poor leper,
great efforts have been made and not without success. For

342 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

the purchase of property, for installations of churches and
suitable houses, the Mission has exhausted all its resources.
Devoted auxiliaries also have brought to the missionaries for
the education of youths an extremely precious help. But this
special work for youths which every man anxious for the
future waited, asked for, of which the necessity imposed itself
and imposes itself stronger to-day than ever, you are the first
that undertook it, and thanks to your zeal, your industry, your
inventive spirit, we now see it in the way of producing happy
results. Once more, my reverend father, receive our gratitude.

" To this work is attached another, no less important than the
first, and which cannot be developed without it. Will you allow
me to speak of it ? It is the press. Until the present day to
speak of books, newspapers, reviews in a country of missions
has always seemed a dream. In the minds of the Catholics of
Europe, japan is still a savage country ; the Catechism, Prayer-
Book, and the beads were enough. With but few exceptions
the appeals made to charity for the work of the press have
always remained without response. This time perhaps the
Russo-Japanese War will have shown that the Japanese are not
in such a profound ignorance, and that they have already made
some progress. The truth is that there is not a country in the
world, even the United States of America, which has more
intellectual life than Japan. All ideas in circulation in other
countries immediately appear in Japan. By the reviews, the
newspapers, and books they are published right away and known.
Religion, politics, moral systems, science, arts, industries,
commerce, the latest in literature, impious, immoral, everything
is announced, published, translated, and read. The worst
novels are known and vulgarized. The press flood the country
every day with productions from all sources and of all sorts.
Revolution, socialism, even anarchy, everything is there.

" And in all this confusion of all opinions and also of all errors,
Catholic truth until the present is hardly represented. Not
withstanding great personal sacrifices, and a zeal worthy of all
praise, the part which the missionaries have been able to take
in the movement of the Press in Japan is far from being in
proportion to the importance of the Catholic religion, with the
utility that it could have for the good of the country, with the
role to which victorious Japan henceforth aspires in the Ex
treme Orient. To light to-day the torch of truth in Japan is
to enlighten quite a large portion of the world.

For this, Reverend Father, you know what is missing men
practised in wielding the pen, and resources to maintain them.
Men you prepare in your family home, your nursery of men,
and you will find the necessary funds.

"The American and English people are better prepared than
any other for understanding such a situation, and for helping
practically by their sympathy and their generosity. Among the
numerous friends and acquaintances that you now have beyond

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN JAPAN 343

the great ocean, I pray you, Reverend Father, plead once more
the cause of our Church and our Japan. For the Catholic
Press, the principal organ of our Christian life, your appeal will
certainly be heard."

But we have quoted enough to convince our readers
of the great dangers which threaten the future of the
Church in Japan, all the more alarming because far more
subtle and insidious than all the ferocious cruelties of
Hideyoshi and leyasu, and their successors. The de
voted pastors of the Church are, thank God, fully alive
to the signs of the times, as their own words prove.
Dark as the outlook may be in many respects, terrible as
is the struggle before them for they may truly say " our
wrestling is not with flesh and blood," but with the spirit
of worldliness and infidelity we still feel encouraged to
hope of ultimate triumph. All the roseate expectations
of 1865, and still more of 1891, are probably not to be
realised so soon ; but it seems almost a want of faith to
doubt that the prayers and groans of St. Francis Xavier,
and the blood of so many martyrs, known and unknown,
poured forth like water during the sixteenth and seven
teenth centuries, will, in God s own good time, bear a
glorious harvest in the century which is beginning.
Fiat, fiat !

BOOKS TO BE CONSULTED.

Louis EUG. Lou VET. " Les Missions Catholiques au XIX e
SiScle." Lille-Paris : Societe de St. Augustin, 1891.

AD. LAUNAY. " Histoire Generale de la Societe des Missions
EtrangeTes," t. iii. Paris : Tequi, 1894.

" Societe des Missions Etrangeres." Compte Rendu des
Travaux (annual).

M. STEICHEN. " The Christian Daimyos ; a Century of Religious
and Political History in Japan (1549-1640)." Tokyo :
Rikkyo Gakuin Press (1904).

MARNAS. "La Religion de Jesus resusscitee au Japan," two
vols. Paris, 1894.

" Supplementum ad Compendium Historiae Ecclestiasicae."
Pulo-Pinang : Collegium Generale, 1895.

DAVID MURRAY. " Japan " (" Story of the Nations "). London :
Fisher Unwin, 1894.

GEORGE A. COBBOLD. " Religion in Japan Shintoism, Budd
hism, Christianity." London : S.P.C.K., 1894.

XIII
THE DANCING PROCESSION AT ECHTERNACH

IT is a curious fact, and perhaps a providential one, that
the only two striking survivals of curious medieval
celebrations testifying to the vitality of the faith in the
Christian masses are to be found amongst those Teutonic
nations with whom began the great revolt against the
Faith in the sixteenth century. Not the hot-blooded
and imaginative sons of Italy or Spain, but the phleg
matic, hard-headed, and intellectual children of Germany
South and North have preserved intact to our days
those two strange fragments of the ages of faith whose
origins are lost in the twilight of the Middle Ages
the Passionspiel of Ober-Ammergau and the Spring-
prozession of Echternach. Having had the good fortune
in 1880 to assist at the decennial performance of the
Bavarian Passion Play, I was only too glad of the oppor
tunity in 1884 of seeing also the annual " Dancing Pro
cession " of this extremely ancient town. A spell of
delightful weather enabled me to combine a large amount
of pleasure with the mingled curiosity and devotion that
led me thither. I have not space here to introduce
to the notice of my readers the natural beauties of the
charming little Grand Duchy of Luxemburg, above all,
to describe in detail the wondrous scenery of the
Muhlerthal. I was fortunate enough to fall in with a
large and agreeable party bent on a foot tour through
this delightful valley en route for Echternach. Let
me here open a brief parenthesis to recommend
any of my readers who are within convenient distance,

344

THE DANCING PROCESSION 345

and who are not afraid to face a good mountain scramble
and a six or seven hours walk, not to miss the chance
of a really pleasant day s out, crowned by a visit to
a shrine that ought to interest all Englishmen that
of St. Willibrord, one of the greatest men that England
ever produced, the Apostle of Northern Germany and
of the Netherlands. We took train from the city of
Luxemburg to the small station of Griindhof, whence
we set off on foot through a beautiful country to gain
the entrance to the romantic valley, with its wild rocks,
its fantastic caverns, and its luxuriant vegetation,
which goes winding through the heart of the land until it
opens out into the lovely valley of the Sauer. Half-way
on our long walk we came to the village Berdorf, where
the tourist ought not to fail to visit the village church,
and see the curious old Roman pagan altar, which was
consecrated for Christian use by St. Willibrord himself,
and is still used as the high-altar of the church. The
massive square block is well preserved, with the figures
at each of the four sides of Hercules, Juno, Apollo, and
Minerva. Beyond Berdorf, the Miihlerthal assumes a
more peaceful and less wild aspect, and reminds one of
nothing so much as the " fairy glen " of Bettws-y-Coed,
only prolonged for many and many a mile. The shades
of evening were already falling when we emerged at last
from the narrow fastnesses of the " Wolf s Glen," and
saw lying at our feet the fruitful valley embosoming the
old abbey town of Echternach, whose origin dates back
to pre-Roman times as attested by its Keltic name*
and the abundant Keltic remains found in its vicinity.
Needless to say, we found the little town of barely 4,000
inhabitants densely crowded, and it was no easy matter
to procure a night s lodging for all our party.

Historians are at a loss to give an account of the origin

of the strange " Dancing Procession " in honour of

St. Willibrord, which is held here every Whit Tuesday ;

for, strange to say, the earlier chronicles maintain a

* Lat. Epternacum.

346 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

strict silence on the subject. It is not till 1553 that
we find any definite indication of the dance, but a picture
painted in that year represents St. Willibrord blessing
the dancers. A decree of the local magistrates about
the same date also speaks of the " Springh heiligenn . . .
uff Pofingst dinstag." The historian Brouwer, who was
born in 1559, often describes this curious ceremony, and
declares that as a child he had heard the procession
spoken of by very old people as a tradition of great
antiquity. A petition of the parish priests of the Eifel
in 1770 to the Archbishop of Trier states that their
ancestors had established this painful act of penance by
vow in times of great necessity 300 years before. But
although the actual dancing is not traceable by docu
ments to a higher antiquity, yet the pilgrimages and
processions of the neighbouring parts of Germany to
the tomb of St. Willibrord are traceable back to the very
death of the saint himself. For this we have the explicit
testimony of another great Anglo-Saxon of the next
generation, Alcuin, the friend of Charlemagne, who,
both in his prose and poetical Life of St. Willibrord,
describes the crowds of pilgrims who flocked to the
shrine at Echternach and the numerous miracles wrought
there.

"Vincula rumpuntur per se properantibus illuc
Qui sua cum lacrymis veniunt mala crimina flere,
Et toti redeunt, Christo donante, soluti."

Still more distinctly does Abbot Thiofred (died mo)
describe in considerable detail the great procession held
in Whit Week, according to immemorial right (" ritu
perpetuo et quasi a progenie in progenies transmissa ") ;
but does not seem to mention the dancing, unless the
word tripudium, frequently used by him, refers to the
custom. Certainly the meaning of dancing is attributed
to it in Ducange. A number of antiquarians, and among
them Cardinal Pitra, attribute a still greater antiquity
to the dancing procession, for they consider it likely
that it is nothing else than some old heathen dance or

THE DANCING PROCESSION 347

triumphal march, which St. Willibrord may have found
in use among the wild populations whom he converted to
Christianity, and which he may have changed into a
Christian celebration, just as the Church did so often
and so prudently during the conversion of the European
tribes, and as Pope Gregory the Great actually allowed
and advised in the case of various pilgrimages and other
usages of heathen nations. This would be all the more
natural in the case of St. Willibrord, who, as we have
seen, consecrated the pagan altar for Christian use at
Berdorf, and I believe at one or two other places in
Belgium. " We should not be astonished," says
Cardinal Pitra, " if an inquiry into the origin of the
procession should lead us to some military and national
march of the ancient Frisians or Saxons, whom St. Willi
brord had permitted to preserve as they followed him,
even up to the doors of his monastery, their patri
archal dance." One of the main arguments in favour
of this theory is the extremely ancient traditional melody
of the procession, which seems to bear rather a joyful
than a penitential character. Other writers have come
to the conclusion that the traditional religious proces
sions to the tomb of St. Willibrord, which have been
going on since his death, were, during the fourteenth
century, purposely altered into a penitential exercise by
means of the fatiguing and painful kind of dance which
now distinguishes it. That was the century of terrible
epidemics, especially of epilepsy and the so-called " St.
Vitus s dance." As the old chronicler writes :

" L an trieze cens soixante et quatorze
A Metz advint piteuse chose,
Qu en la cite ville et champs
Gens danssoient du bien sainct Jean.
Le prestre en faisant son office,
Les seigneurs scans en justice,
Le laboureur en son labour,
Sur qui que tombait la douleur,
Et danssiaent neuf ou dix jours,
Sans avoir repos ny sejour."

348 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

As a matter of fact, it is known for certain that this was
the origin of the spring procession at Prum, founded
about 1340, but long since extinct. Again, it is certain
that the object of the dancing processions now, and for
the last few centuries, has been penitential, and especi
ally for the averting of St. Vitus s dance and epilepsy.
Lastly, the popular legend, which may be read in Collin
de Plancy s " Fiddler of Echternach," connects the dance
with Vitus himself, who appears as a wondrous fiddler,
and whose adventures are strangely like those of the
Pied Piper of Hamelin. Whichever of these two theories
we accept, it is clear that in the dancing procession we have
a curious custom of very great antiquity, preserving not
merely its vitality, but actually, after its brief interrup
tion during the days of Joseph II. and the French Revolu
tion, yearly increasing in size and popularity, as the
following numbers of those who take part in it will show :
1831, 4,500 ; 1841, 8,887 ; 1861, 10,991 ; 1872, 12,272 ;
1881, 15,541. The whole ceremony and its surroundings
impress the spectator mostly by the wonderful faith and
devotion of the thousands of pilgrims who flock to it.
Not without difficulty were the numerous priests able
to say Mass in the ancient parish church where the shrine
of St. Willibrord is exposed to the veneration of the
faithful under the high-altar. From early daybreak
long processions of peasantry, headed by their clergy,
and with cross and banners, are seen wending their way
down the fruitful hillsides towards the banks of the
Sauer. They are all singing and praying aloud, and
have come journeys of six, eight, or ten hours on foot
men, women, and children. The famous Gross-Prum
pilgrimage, indeed, comes a journey of three days. Each
procession pours into the parish church, and makes the
tour of the high -altar, singing or reciting the Litany of
St. Willibrord at the very top of their voices ; and, as
many of the pilgrimages are in the edifice at the same
time, the effect is rather impressive than harmonious.
Indeed, I can assure the reader that a priest has some

THE DANCING PROCESSION 349

difficulty in saying Mass amidst the surging sea of voices
which fill the church, or, indeed, of making his way to
the altar through the dense mass of human beings which
fill the place.

At nine o clock the great " Maxglocke," the big bell
given by Emperor Maximilian, the " last of the Knights,"
and the last of the numerous Imperial pilgrims, in 1512,
rang out the opening of the ceremony. The Veni
Creator having been intoned by the clergy in front of the
tomb of St. Willibrord, the great procession moved across
the ancient pre-Roman bridge to the Prussian side of the
Sauer, where, on the bank of that river, a short sermon
was delivered. I regret to say that the crowd was so
dense that I was unable to approach the bridge, much
less pass it, and so am unable to describe this part of the
day s proceedings. The sermon ended, the town bands
struck up the peculiar old traditional melody, and, as if
by magic, as when the legendary Vitus drew the first
notes across his magic violin, the thousands assembled
in their ranks for the procession began their curious hop
or dance, and the entire body slowly started their toil
some march through the old town. I was fortunate in
being accommodated at a window of the pro-Gymnasium,
whose courteous rector also afforded me hospitality on
the preceding night. Looking down from this point of
vantage, the sight was indeed a memorable one. First
came the clergy in surplice, with a choir of singers, cross,
and banners ; then the band playing the often-mentioned
melopeon of the dance.

The melody is scarcely a melancholy one, but rather
suggestive of a joyful origin. It has something quaint
about it, and when it has been heard for some three hours,
repeated over and over again on every kind of instru
ment of the most atrocious character, suggestive of pain
fully asthmatic German bands, it haunts the memory,
and is not easily forgotten. I had been told by every
body that the impression produced by the procession
was not, as might be expected, ludicrous or grotesque,

350 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

but rather weird and painful. Let me hasten to say
that my own experience fully confirms this judgment.
Immediately after the band the hundreds of school
children, the boys all in their shirt-sleeves, hopping
merrily and evidently enjoying the exercise, form rather
an amusing and pleasing picture. Many of these children
are hired to dance for people who are unable to take part in
the procession themselves. On our arrival at Echternach
the night before, we were met by a decent-looking lad,
who politely doffed his cap, and asked if we required any
one to dance for us on the morrow. They receive a
small gratuity for thus acting as proxies. But when you
see between ten and twelve thousand grown-up men and
women, hardy, sunburnt sons of toil, some of great
age, others afflicted with various bodily infirmities, their
faces marked by the deepest seriousness and earnestness,
painfully springing the curious steps two steps forward
and one obliquely backwards laughter dies away from
your lips ; you are moved rather to sadness sometimes
to tears. It must be remembered that all these people
are going through the exercise as a penitential work,
either to obtain delivery for themselves or some member
of their family from the terrible visitation of epilepsy or
kindred diseases, or in thanksgiving for cures obtained,
or else to avert the same from their families, or, lastly, in
fulfilment of some vow of themselves or their ancestors.
This accounts for the great earnestness displayed on
their features and in their movements. Many of the
men dance in their shirt-sleeves. I noticed that nearly
all the women, young and old, carried ample baskets on
their left arm, no doubt containing the day s provisions.
The ranks vary from four to six persons in breadth. As
a rule, the dancers seem to go by families, though in some
parts the men and women are grouped separately. The
so-called dance is executed with precision only by a few,
who really take the steps with considerable accuracy ;
in most cases it resolves itself into a kind of hop or skip
forward and backward, to the cadence of the music. It

THE DANCING PROCESSION 351

is extremely curious to look down from a window upon the
surging mass of people swaying alternately backwards
and forwards, with a slow onward movement, exactly
like the waves of the sea at the edge of the coast. Now
and again there are pauses for much-needed rest, and
then after a few minutes the quaint movement is re
sumed. Here and there comes a band, or a small knot
of amateur musicians, perhaps a fiddle and a couple of
flutes, or a flute and a kettle-drum, or an accordion with
a triangle, all repeating the melody, and nearly all of the
very vilest description. About three hours are con
sumed in the entire course of the 1,225 steps. The
procession winds through the town up the sixty-two
steep steps of the Petersberg, into the church, round the
shrine of St. Willibrord, out into the churchyard, and
finally thrice round the wooden cross in the same.
Generally the weather at this time is intensely hot, and
then the " springing " under the blazing rays of an almost
tropical sun is a terrible work of mortification indeed.
Fortunately, the weather at my visit was overcast and
cool. But even so, all along the course charitable people
were to be seen running out of their houses and offering
glasses of wine or sugared water, or even vinegar and
water, to the exhausted dancers. Let me here note as
a pleasing feature that every person in the streets,
whether among dancers or spectators remained bare
headed during the whole time of the procession. Nothing
could exceed the respect and reverence shown on all
sides. Among the persons particularly noticed in the
procession, I must mention an old woman, who carried
astride on her shoulders a girl of some ten or twelve years,
afflicted with epilepsy, clinging to her neck. The old
dame danced with painful earnestness, and the sight of
her struggling beneath the weight of her unfortunate
burthen was really pitiful to behold. Another woman
carried her afflicted child in her arms, and evidently must
have suffered much under the weight of it during the
three mortal hours of the procession. Two well-dressed

352 SKETCHES IN HISTORY

girls, holding their afflicted brother between them, were
springing with an energy that was actually painful to wit
ness. Several blind persons were among the " springers."
I also noticed a curious little dwarf of minute propor
tions, who danced with great zeal and devotion. The
lines of dancers generally held together, either hand in
hand, or by means of umbrellas or even pocket-handker
chiefs stretched from one to the other to facilitate their
movement. At the end of the dancers came the dense
body of " prayers " (Beter), perhaps two or three
thousand in number, not dancing, but praying aloud
with wondrous fervour. In an Englishman the constant
refrain, " Heiliger Willibrordus, bitt fur uns !" borne in
upon thousands of voices, cannot but produce a thrill of
patriotic gratification, but at the same time a feeling of
regret that this great Saxon Apostle is so little known in
his Dative land.

It is calculated that 10,000 or 15,000 spectators
thronged the little town. Among them were the newly-
consecrated Bishop of Luxemburg, Mgr. Koppes, and
his Excellency the Papal Internuncio at the Hague,
Mgr. Spolverini. The number of ecclesiastics German,
Belgian, and French was enormous. I also noticed
two curious hermits in a kind of monastic dress ; for in
the rocks which border the valley of the Sauer there is
still to be found here and there an odd cavern or grotto
which houses a solitary hermit as in days of yore.

About one o clock the famous procession and the
whole of the religious proceedings were over, and the
rest of the day was given up to more worldly affairs in
the shape of a kind of Kermess, or great fair. The
market-place is crowded with booths of all kinds of
wonders and monstrosities, shooting-galleries, wax
works, merry-go-rounds, and all the varied parapher
nalia of village wakes, while the streets are lined with
stalls for the sale of every conceivable article, from
sugar saints to boots and shoes.

I had intended to say something of the superb old

THE DANCING PROCESSION 353

Benedictine Abbey, once one of the most famous in all
Europe, and the " flos regulae " of St. Benedict, and of
the splendid basilica, now so happily restored ; but I
fear that I have already too long trespassed on the
patience of my readers. I feel, however, bound to say
that I saw nothing degrading, repulsive, or ludicrous in
the curious sight I was privileged to witness. Quaint,
strange, weird, even somewhat painful, it all is ; but the
main impression left on the mind is that of the marvel
lous spirit of faith, of devotion, and of penance, rooted
so firmly in the very nature of this hardy German
peasantry, as testified by the more than 20,000 pilgrims,
whether springers or spectators, who crowded into the
little and ancient town of St. Willibrord, the Northum
brian Saint and Apostle of Lower Germany.

ADDENDA.

To p. 341. The little volume " Le Catholicisme au Japon,"
by Albert Vogt (Paris, Librairie Bloud), did not fall into my
hands until the present book was completed. I should also
add " Les Missions Catholiques Francaises au XIX e Sicle," by
Fr. Piolet, t. iii. (Paris).

T P- 353- An account of the "Dancing Procession" this
year (1905) by an eye-witness (" M. R.") appears in The
Harvest tor October, 1905.

354

INDEX

Abbeloos, Monsignor, 200, 219
note

Abbots Langley, village of, 55

Abelard, 78

Abraham, Mr., 271, 286

Achaemenid Kings of Persia, 13

Adelaide, divorced wife of Frederick
Barbarossa, 85

Adelperga, 31

Adelung, 316

Adelwald, 41

Adnacul or Adhnachd (a burial-
place), 9

Adnet, Abbe", 321

Adrian I., Pope, 152 note

Adrian II., Pope, 152 note

Adrian III., Pope, 152 note

Adrian IV. (Nicholas Breakspeare)
and Ireland, 53; and Henry II.,
53 ; birthplace, 55 ; boyhood, 56 ;
studies at Paris and Aries, 57 ;
connection with Order of the
Norbertines, 57 etseq. ; enters the
Abbey of St. Rufus at Avignon,
59-60 ; elected abbot, 60 et seq. ;
appeals to Rome against his
monks, 61 ; retained by Euge-
nius III. and created cardinal,
62 ; appointed Apostolic Legate
to Scandinavia, 63 ; visits Eng
land, 63 ; his work in Norway, 63
et seq. ; his work in Sweden, 65 ;
his mission to Denmark, 65 ;
tries to avert a dispute between
Sweden and Denmark, 65 ; his
linguistic attainments, 65-66 ;
elected Pope, 66 ; struggle with
the Roman republicans, 67-68,
70 et seq. ; places Rome under an
interdict, 68 ; dealings with

Frederick Barbarossa, 69 et seq. ;
the question of homage, 71 et seq. ;
crowns Frederick at Rome, 74 ;
quarrel with William II. , Norman
King of Sicily, 75 et seq. ; rela
tions with the Eastern Churches,
76 ; relations with England, 77 et
seq. ; alleged grant of Ireland to
Henry II., 79 et seq. ; renewal of
struggle with Frederick Barbar
ossa, 84 et seq.; the champion of
Italian liberty, 86 et seq.; his
death, 87 ; personal character,
88 ; works, 88 ; policy, 88 ; bib
liography, 89 ; other references,
105, 106, 152 note, 153
Adrian V., Pope, 152 note
Adrian VI. (Adrian of Utrecht) and
Princess Margaret of York, 104-
105, in ; birth and parentage,
105 ; educated by the Brothers of
the Common Life, 106 ; goes to
Louvain University, 108 ; gains
the title of " Primus," 109 ;
studies theology at the College
du Saint-Esprit, 109 ; professor of
philosophy and theology, no ;
Canon of St. Pierre, no ; Cur of
the Be"guinage, no ; Doctor of
Divinity, no etseq.; receives many
benefices, in ; professor at Uni
versity of Louvain, 112 ; pub
lishes his " Qusestiones in Quar-
tum Sententiarum Librum " and
" Questiones Quodlibeticse," 112 ;
elected Chancellor of University,
113 ; twice chosen Rector Magni-
ficus, 113 ; personal appearance
and character, 113 et seq.; erects
college at Louvain, 114, 150;

355 232

356

INDEX

comes under the notice of Pope
Julius II., 114; tutor to Prince
Charles and his sisters, 116 et
seq.; nominated by Charles to a
seat on the council of the Low
Countries, 117; sent on embassies,
117-118 ; nominated Regent of
Castile, 118 ; made Bishop of
Tortosa, 119; resigns his benefices
in Low Countries, 119 ; nomi
nated Grand Inquisitor of Arragon
and Navarre, 119 et seq.; created
Cardinal by Leo X., 120; made
Viceroy of Castile, 122 ; elected
Pope, 123 et seq.; election not due
to the influence of Charles V.,
131 et seq.; retains his baptismal
name, 132 ; refuses to become the
tool of Charles V., 134-135 ; the
journey from Spain to Rome, 135
et seq.; reforms Papal Court, 139
et seq.; relations with humanism,
142 et seq.; aims similar to those
of Pope Pius II., 143 note ; efforts
to beat back the Turk, 143 et seq.,
149; and Lutheranism, \<\$etseq.;
desires to convoke an (Ecumenical
Council, 147 ; canonizes St. An
toninus and St. Benno, 148 ;
forms international league to
defend Italy against Francis I.,
149; illness and death, 149 et
seq.; estimate of his work, 152^
seq. ; bibliography, 153 ; further
reference, 192

Adrian Florisze, Master, 105

yElian on inhumation, 12

Africa, funeral customs of, 21-22

Agelmund, first King of the Lom
bards, 34, 41

Agilulf, King, 30, 41

Aguilera, monastery of, 121

Ahu itzoll, slaughter of, 21

Ahura-Mazda, 13

Aio (or Agio), 33, 34

Aix-la-Chapelle, 121

Aken, near Paderborn, 191 note

Alaric, 16

Albano, Nicholas Breakspeare cre
ated Bishop of, 62

Albert the Great, Blessed, 235, 236

Alboin, King, 38, 40, 41, 42, 44,
46

Alcala, University of, 119, 192

Alcuin, 31, 155 note, 346

Aldrich, 163

Alexander of Hales, 159,

Alexander II., Pope, 83

Alexander III., Pope, 78 note, 83

Alexander VI., Pope, 162

Alfred, King, 48 ; and the founda
tion of Oxford, 200, 201

Aligherius (Dante), etymology of
name, 48, 49

All Souls College, Oxford, 160

Allen, Dr. William (after wards Car
dinal), 180, 181, 182, 185

Allies, Mr. T. W., 239, 281, 288,

2 93

Alvarez, Father, S.J., 317

Alzog, Dr., 75

Ambri, 33

American Episcopal Church in
Japan, 334

Ampleforth College, 259

Ampolla, 136

Anagni, 68

" Analecta Juris Pontificii," 81

Anastasius IV., Pope, 66

Anderdon, Father, S.J., 288, 293

Andrew, 175

Angles, 43

" Anglicanism" and scientific theo
logy, 180

Anglo-Saxons and Lombards, points
of contact as regards dress, 44,

47 ; language, 45-47 ; political in
stitutions, 47-48 ; love of liberty,

48 ; temperament and character,
48-50

Angro-Mainyus, 13

Animism, 187

Anjiro (Han-Siro), afterwards Paul

of the Holy Faith, 302, 303,

308
Annals of the Four Masters " on

the state of Ireland about the

time of Pope Adrian IV. , 84
Anstey, " Epistolae Academicae "

quoted, 211
Anthaib, 34
Antibes, 136
Antonius, 236
Antwerp, 196, 208
Anushin, 318
Apollodorus of Rhodes on building

of funeral pyre, n
Apostolic origin of Litany of Loreto,

alleged, 224, 230
Areson, Bishop John, 99
Arianism, Lombards and, 41
Arichis II., 31

INDEX

357

Arima, revolt of Christians in princi
pality of, 315

Aries, Nicholas Breakspeare studies
at, 57. 59

Armstrong, Mr. T., 55

Arnaldo da Brescia, 67, 68, 70, 71

Arnold, Sir Edwin, 186

Arnold of Gheilhoven, 96

Arnold, Matthew, 299

Arthur, Prince (brother of Henry
VIII.), 169

Arthur, fellow of St. John s College,
Cambridge, 165, 166

Articles in Dublin Review, sugges
tions by Cardinal Wiseman for,
281, 282

Aryans and neolithic age, 7 ; cradle-
land of, 9 ; originators of crema
tion, 8, 9, 22, 24 ; funeral customs
of, 15, 16

Ascham, Roger, 173, 177

Assi, 33

Assipitti (probably the Usipetes of
Caesar and Tacitus), 33

Assyrian Empire, burial customs of
16

Assyriology, 186

Astodans (bone receptacles), 14

Athelstan, 48

Audoin, 38, 44

Augsburg, printing press at, 92, 96

Augustinians at Oxford, 166, 173 ;
of Recanati, 226 ; arrive in Japan,
311 ; martyrs in Japan, 314

Australia, funeral customs of, 22

Authari, King, 41, 42

" Auxilium Christianorum," origin
of the invocation, 228, 229, 232

" Avesta," 9, 14 ; Lou vain and the,
187 ; first manuscript of the, 199,
216

Ayuthia, ancient capital of Siam,

319

Aztecs, 21, 22

Babylonian Empire, burial customs

of, 16
Babylonian and Oriental Record,

J 4

Bacon, Lord, 106 note, 159 note, 184
Bacon, Robert, 158
Bacon, Roger, 155 note, 158, 159

and note, 185,
Baeumer, Dom Suitbert, O.S.B.,

slight error in his History of the

Breviary," 228

Bagshawe, Mr. H. R., editor of
Dublin Review, 269, 270, 272,
278, 286, 298

Bainab, 34

Baines, Bishop, Vicar Apostolic of
the Western District, 248, 250,

2 S9

Bamberg, Abbey of St. Michael at,
98

Baptism retained by the "redis
covered" Christians of Japan, 325,
326

Baptismal vows, renewal of, 253

Baptists in Japan, 334

Barcelona, 136; Cucufatis Monas
tery at, 98 ; priest-printers at, 99

Bardenea, 37

Bardengau, 35

Bardowyk, 35

Bari, 76

Barnabites, 139

Barnes, Robert, Augustinian Prior,
166, 167

Baronius, Annals of, 80

Bartolemeo, priest - printer of
Florence, 99

Basel, printing press at, 92, 99 ;
John Wesel at, 190

Basil, Bishop of Thessalonica, 76

Bathhurst, Miss, 244

Bauwens, Dr. Isidore, on funeral
and mourning customs, 2 et seq.,
7, 8, 18, 25

Baxter, Mr. Dudley, 62 note

Beardeneu, 37

Beardincgford, 37

Beatrice, heiress of Burgundy, 85

Beconton, Devonshire, 206

Bedmond, hamlet of, 55

Beelen, 190

Belgium, Royal Academy of, 188

Bellasis, Mr. Sergeant, 239

Bellesheim, 81

Bellintonus, Mattheus, 151 note

Benedictines at Oxford, 159, 173

Benevento, dukedom of, 31, 40, 76

Benson, Dr., Archbishop of Canter
bury, 240

Benzoni, Rutilio, Bishop of Loreto,
229

Berdorf, altar in church at, 345,

347
Bergamo, 50; its "priest-printer,"

99

Berlioz, Mgr., Bishop of Hakodate,
330, 331 note

358

INDEX

Bernard a Sancto Leone, 58
Bernardinus de Bustis, 236
Berners, Dame Juliana, Prioress of

Sopewell, 96
Berni, 143

Berthier, Pere, O.P., 157 note
Berthold, Archbishop of Mainz,

93

Besanpon, Diet of, 85
Bettws-y-Coed and the Miihlerthal,

345
Bible and inhumation among the

Jews, 17, 18

Bible, Antwerp Polyglot, 189
Bible, editions of, in fifteenth and

sixteenth centuries, 100-102
Bible in early University library at

Oxford, 2ii

Bible Society and Japan, 320
Bibliotheque du Roi, Paris, 213, 215,

216
Bickersteth, Miss, on the rivalry of

the Christian sects in Japan, 334-

335

Biella, 50
Binterim on the antiquity of the

Litany of Loreto, 224
Bishops, list of Japanese, 331 note
Blanche Nef, wreck of the, 56
Bluime, 36

Boardman, Rev. James, 265
Boat burial. See Water burial
Bocher, Joan, 177 note
Bodleian Library, Oxford, 198 et

seq.; 210 et seq.
Bodley, Sir Thomas, 210, 212, 218,

221 note
" Bokys of Hawking and Hunting,"

by Dame Juliana Berners, Prioress

of Sopewell, 96
Bologna, Diet of, 86; University of,

156, 157 note, 177, 201, 202
Bonanni, 59
Boneto Locatello, 99
Bonnani, 151 note
Bono, Giovanni, 151 note
" Bonus Joannes," MonkofSavona,

97
Bonzes, influence of the, 306, 309,

330 note, 333, 334
Booker and Dolman, publishers,

277

Bopp, philologist, 216
Bourchier, Richard, merchant, 213
Bowden, Father of the Oratory,

239

Bowyer, Mr. (afterwards Sir
George), 282

Bozidar, Duke of Servia, 97

Brabant, Counts of, 104 note, 105,
201

Bradley on spelling of "Scandi
navia," "$$note

Brahmanism and cremation, 24

Breakspeare, Nicholas. See Adrian
IV.

Breakspeare, Boso, 78 and note

Breakspeare, Robert, 56

Breslau, " priest printers" at, 99

Breviary, Roman, on the origin of
the title " Auxilium Christianum,"
228

Brewer, Professor, 155, 167 note

Bridgett, Father, C.SS.R., 155

Brindisi, 76

British Museum Library, 220 note

Brixen, "priest-printers" at, 99

Broadgate s Hall, Oxford, 208

Broomhead, Father Rowland, 266

Brothers of the Common Life, 95,
106, 190

Brower on the dancing procession,
346

Brown, Dr., Vicar Apostolic (after
wards first Bishop of Liverpool),
267

Browne, 180

Brownson s Review, 291

Bruckner on the Lombards. See
chap, \\.passim

Briin, " priest-printers " at, 99

Bruno the Carthusian, 235

Brussels, press at Convent of Naza
reth at, 95

Bryan, 163

Bucer, Martin, 174, 175

Buda-Pesth, printing press at, 92

Buddhism and cremation, 14, 24 ;
disestablished in Japan, 330 note

Bulet,Abbe",on religious indifference
in Japan, 339

" Bullarium," Roman, 80

Bullock, 163, 174

Bullock, Dr., 91

Bunsen, Chevalier, 279, 286

Burghley, Lord, 177-179, 207

Burgundaib, 34

Burgundians, 34, 39

Burgundy, Dukes of, 201

Burial, art of, i ; general conclu
sions, 24-25 ; bibliography, 25.
See also Cremation, Inhumation,

INDEX

359

Exposition, Water-burial, Em
balming, Tree-burial, Platform-
burial, Funeral customs
Burnouf, Eugene, 199, 217, 218
Burns and Lambert, publishers,

277

Burns and Gates, publishers, 277
Busleiden, Giles (/Egidius Bus-

lidius), 142, 191, 194
Busleiden, Jerome, 191 et seq.
Bustum (a tomb), 9

Caccia, Fa her, on Father Furlong,

259-260

Caesar Cistariensis, 235
Cassarism, {9

Caius College, Cambridge, 177, 179
Caius, Dr., 177, 179
Calvinists, at Cambridge, 169
" Cambridgt Modern History " on

the concla e which elected Adrian

VI., 127 ; and relations between

Leo X. aid Raffaele, 143 note;

and Luthe:, 146
Cambridge, Jniversity of, chapter

vi. , passim ; work of Blessed

John Fishe at, 162 et seq., 170 et

seq.; Luthranism at, \b$etseq.;

Royal div<rce and, 168 et seq. ;

Reformation changes at, 176 ;

foundation of Queen Mary s

reign, 177
Camden, 183

Camm, DomBede, 208 note
Campeggio, Cardinal Lorenzo, 120,

138
Campion, Bsssed Edmund, S.J.,

1 80

Candia, 145
Candiotti, Qulio, Arch-priest of

Loreto, 22*229
Cannibalism a Australia and Africa,

22

Canstadt raci, 3
Cantwell, Re. Edmund, 265
Capes, Mr. JM., 288
Caraffa, Cardnal (afterwards Paul

IV.), 99

Cardinal Col. ge, Oxford, 163, 170
Carfax, the, xford, 168
Carnero, Mehior, S.J., Bishop of

Nicaea, ^note

Carnoy, Protesor, biologist, 218
Carriers, cunus Indian custom, 21

and note
Carthusians, 108

Cartwright, 180, 181

Carvajal, Bernardino, Cardinal di
Santa Croce, 114, 125, 137

Casaroto, Giampietro, 98

Casartelli, Mr. J., and the great
mission in Liverpool, 256

Cashel Hoey, Mr. , and the Dublin
Review, 270, 290, 293, 294, 298

Cashel Hoey, Mrs., and the Dublin
Review, 270, 294

Cassell s " Conquests of the Cross "
quoted, 313

Catherine Hall, Cambridge, 160

Catherine, Queen of Henry VIII.,
1 68 et seq,

Catholic Record Society "Miscel
lanea," 221

Catholic Truth Society and the
printing press, 103

Cattle, slaughtering of black, in
Greek and Roman funeral rites,
it

Cecil, William, Baron Burghley,
Chancellor of University of Cam
bridge, 177-179, 207

Ce"cile, Rear-Admiral, assists mis-
sioners to reach the Liu Kiu
Islands, 321

Celibacy, idea of, preserved among
the survivors of early Japanese
Christianity, 325-326

Cenna (or Zinna), monastery at, 98

" Centum Gravimina," 147

Cerberus, n

Cesarini, Cardinal, 136

Cettinje, monastery press at, 97

Chaldean burial-places, 17

Chamberlain, 306

Chancellor, office of, at University
of Oxford, 157

Charlemagne visited by Paul the
Deacon, 31 ; deposes Desiderius,
40

Charles the Bold, Duke of Bur
gundy, 104, 114, 116

Charles V., Emperor, 114 et seq.

Charles I., King, and the Bodleian
Library, 219

Charlton, Dr,, 281

Charnock, 162

Chatron, Jules, S.M.E., Bishop of
Osaka, 331 note, 339

Chedsey, 174, 175

Cheke, John, 173, 177

Cheregato, Francesco, Papal Le
gate, 147

INDEX

Chevillard, Abbe", " Siam et les

Siamois," 23-24
Chinese favour inhumation, 14 ;

influence on Japanese, 305
Chorten (cenotaph), 15
Choto, Father Maeda, on the needs

of the Church in Japan, 336, 338,

341-343

Christi, Father, S.J., 281, 288
Christina, Prioress of Markgate, 77
Christmas kept by the survivors of

early Japanese Christianity, 324
"Chronicon Monast. S. Albani," 77

and note

Church and printing press: autho
rities, 90 note ; printing, in its
origin and early history, essen
tially a Catholic art, 90-93 ; grants
indulgences for sale and dissemin
ation of printed books, 93 ; the
Religious Orders set up presses,
94 et seq. ; the secular " priest-
printers " develop the art, 98 et
seq, ; the clergy patronize lay
printers, 99 ; the Luther legend,

100-102

Church Missionary Society in Japan,

334

Cice", Monsignor, 319
Cicero, 12
Cirillo, Bernardino, author of the

Macerata Prayer-Book , 230 note
Cistercians at Oxford, 173
Civita Vecchia, 124, 137, 145
Clarendon Press, Oxford, 201, 210
Clarke, Miss E. M. , 297
Clarke, John, 167
Clement, Dorothy, 205
Clement, John, Professor of Greek

at Oxford, 199, 206
Clement, Margaret, 205 and note
Clement of Padua, 98
Clement VII., Pope, 145, 152 note,

164

Clement, Winifred, 205, 207
Clerk, English Ambassador in

Rome, 128

Clifford, Dr., Bishop of Clifton, 297
Clitheroe, Venerable Margaret, 314
Cluny, Abbey of, 98
Cobbe, Richard, 213
Cobbold, Mr. G. A., on religion in

Japan, 315-316, 333. 339, 343
Cobham, Thomas, Bishop of Wor
cester, 210
Codes, Lombard, 48

Codex Gothanus. 30

Cogan, Mr. H., 302

Coleridge, Father, S.J., 239, 293,
301 note, 302, 303, 305

Colet, Dean, 161, 203

Colinet, Professor, 297

Collado, Father, O. P., 317

College du Pape Adrien VI., Lou-
vain, 114 and note

Collin, Abbe", nominated Prefect
Apostolic of Japan, 322

Collin de Plancy s " Fiddler of
Echternach," 348

Cologne, printing press at, 92 ;
Carthusians, 97 ; BiHe of, 101 ;
University of, 201, 202

Columbus, 302

Commission, Special, fcr the Royal
Divorce, 168 et seq.

Commissioners of KingEdward VI.
at Oxford, 212

Como, province of, 49,50

"Comparative Histoy of Reli
gions," 186, 187

"Comparative Mythobgy," 186

" Compendium Historse Ecclesias-
ticae," 310 note, 39 note, 331
note, 343

Compte Rendu des Tnvaux de la
"Socie te des Mission:Etrangeres,"
332, 333 note, 335, 39, 343

Comuneros, Civil Wa of the, 122

Conclave on death of Leo X., 127
et seq.

Concordat, Cardinal Wiseman s
lectures on, 282

Congregation of Rite, decree re
specting the invocaion " Regina
sine labe originali cocepta," 232
and note

Congregationalists in Jtpan, 334

" Consolations " of Bdthius, 97

Constantinople, art of finting in, 92

Cooper, 155

Copenhagen, " priestwinters " at,

99

Corpus Christi CollegeOxford, 163,
1 80, 192 and note

Corre, Abbe\ 332

Cortes of Valencia preided over by
Adrian VI. , 121 et si.

Cosmic, publisher, 230

Cottisford, Dr., Unisrsity Com
missioner, 167

Cousin, Mgr., Bishop f Nagasaki,
329-331 note, 339, 34

INDEX

361

Coventry, 195, 255

Cox, Dr., 175

Cranmer, Thomas, 168, 174

Creighton, Mandell, Dr., Bishop of
London, 53, 81, 88 ; and chap. v.
passim

Cremation not found among Palaeo
lithic races, 4 ; first traces in Neo
lithic Age, 5 ; first appears in Spain
with introduction of bronze, 6 ;
disappears from Spain in the
"Silver Age," 6; general con
clusions of Dr. Bauwens, 7 ;
Aryans originated cremation, 7,
8, 24 ; practised by only a few
non-Aryan races, 8 ; evidence of
its prevalence before Aryan sepa
ration, 8, 9; Eranians abandon
cremation, 8, 9, 13 ; cremation in
Vedic times, 10, 11-12 ; in Homer
and Virgil, u, 12 ; Apollodorus
of Rhodes, n ; among the Greeks,
12 ; among the Romans, 12, 13,
18 ; among Buddhists, 14 ; in
Tibet, 15; among Gauls, Ger
mans, and Scandinavians. 16 ;
traces found in Tunis, 18 ; in
America (island of St. Catherine),
20 ; among the American Indians,
21 ; East Indian Archipelago, 22 ;
general conclusions, 24, 25

Croatia, 149

Croly, Dr., 286

Cro-Magnon race, 3

Cromwell, Oliver, and the Bodleian
Library, 219

Crook, Mr. T. Mewburn, 55

Croskell, Rev. Robert (afterwards
Provost of Salford), 265 ; account
of Dr. Gentilli s mission in Man
chester, 265-268

Cross, trampling on the, in Japanese
persecutions, 314-315

Crumwell, Thomas, 164, 172, 173

Cunimund, 38, 42

Cunningham, General, 15

Cureton, Dr., 279

Curia, Adrian VI. and, 140

Cusack, M. F., 278 note

Cusanus, Cardinal Nicholas, 94

Cyrus, 13

Dahlmann, Father, Joseph, S.J.,

317 note
Dakhma (a burning place), 9, 13,

14

Dalaber, 167

Dalgairns, Father, of the Oratory,

239

Dalmatia, 149

Da Lucca, Francesco, 99

Damberger, 81

Dancing procession at Echternach,
the two great survivals of ages of
faith, 344 ; the road to Echternach,
344-345 ; no definite indication of
the dance until 1553, 346 ; theory
of its pagan origin, 346-347 ; theory
of its Christian origin, 347-348 ;
scene in the parish church, 348-
349 ; the procession itself, 349-352 ;
the spectators, 352 ; the Kermess
or fair, 352 ; the main impression,

353

Dante, 92, 158, 223-224 note
Darmesteter, Professor James, Orien
talist, 218
D Assoneville, Jacques, professor of

the Sorbonne, 112
De Bonaccursi, Francesco, 99
De Bossi, Andrea, Bishop of Alaria,

93-94

De Foix, Andre", 123
De Grousselt, Jean, 202
De Gubernatis, 186
De Harlez, Monsignor, Orientalist,

190, 199, 217, 218, 297
De Morgan, Professor, 281
De Morgianis, Lorenzo, 99
De la Chaulx, Ambassador of

Charles V., 133, 134
De la Motte Lambert, Monsignor,

319

De Langobardorum gestis, 30
Delft, 106, 107
De Lisle, Mr. Ambrose Phillips,

meets Dr. Gentili in Rome, 245 ;

invites him to England, 245, 248 ;

makes his house "Grace Dieu "

centre of missionary activity, 251
De Lisle, Mr. Edwin, 246 note
Denifle, Father, O.P., 157
Denmark, Cardinal Nicholas Break -

speare s mission to, 65 ; art of

printing in, 92

De Palude, Joannes, 204 note
De Quincey, Thomas, i
De Rubeis, 225
De Rycke, Louise, 109
De Santi, Father Angelo, S.J., 223,

226 note, 237
De Schore, Louis, 204

362

INDEX

Deshimo, Dutch resident at, pro
tects missioner, 321

Desiderius, thirtieth and last Lom
bard king, 31, 40

D Estienne, 7

De Torres, Father Cosmo, S.J., 303

Devad&ru (deodar or divine tree), 10

Deventer, 107

Deza, Grand Inquisitor of Arragon
and Navarre, 120

Dictionary of National Biography "
on Adrian IV., 53, 81, 88

Diego de las Llagas, Father, O. S. F. ,
318

Dietsche IVarande, articles in, on
"The Church and the Printing-
press," 90 note

Dio Cassius, 30

Dionysius of Halicarnassus, his
torian, 223

Disabilities of English Catholics
before Emancipation Act, 246-247

Di San Bartolommeo, Father Paul,
Carmelite and Orientalist, 217
and note

" Divina Commedia," one of the
earliest printed books, 92 note

Divorce Question of Henry VIII.,
English Universities and the, 168
et seq., 182 note; supported by
Robert Wakefield, 195 ; Univer
sity of Louvain and the, 204

Dolman, C., publisher, 277

Domenico da Pistoja, 97

Dominicans, Adrian VI. and, 150 ;
at Oxford, 158, 173, 180 ; in
Japan, 311 ; martyrs, 314 ; literary
activity, 317

Dominic, Father, Passionist, 253

Domodossola, novitiate of the Insti
tute of Charity, 245, 248

" Donation of Constantine," 80, 82,
84

Dormer, Lady Jane, 209 note

Dorpius, Martin, 112

Douay, 182, 205

Drane, Mother Augusta Theodosia,
158 note

Dress, Lombard and Anglo-Saxon,
44, 47

Dnffield, Rev. W. E. , 298

Drouart, Abbe", 337, 340

Dublin \_Review\ Makers of the ;
Bibliographical details, 269-273 ;
Wiseman attributes first inception
to Mr. Michael Quin, 273 ; irregu

larity of issue, 274 and note ; four
periods in its history, 274-275 ;
choice of the title, 275; editors
of first series, 275-276 ; financial
difficulties, 276-277 ; O Connell re
commends it to Irish clergy and
Bishops, 277-278 ; Wiseman prac
tically literary editor, 278-279 ;
reference to Review in his letters
and articles, 279-284 ; Wiseman
on the spirit of the Review, 284-
285 ; Dr. Russell s work, 285-286 ;
other contributors, 286-287 ; st yl e
of the articles, 287 ; the Review
and the Oxford Movement, 288 ;
lady contributors, 289 ; illustra
tions, 289 ; length of articles, 289 ;
characteristics of the second series
under Dr. Ward, 290-292; work
of Mr. Cashel Hoey, 293 ; the
chief contributors, 293-294 ; the
spirit of the third series under
Bishop Hedley, 294-295 ; all the
articles must be signed, 296 ; chief
contributors, 296-297 ; new fea
tures, 297-298 ; editor and sub
editor, 298 ; the fourth series
under Canon Moyes, 298-299

Dublin Review on Nicholas Break -
speare, 60 note

Ducange, 346

Du Chaillu, Mr. Paul, on "The
Viking Age," 16

Dugdale, 155

Dulcibello, printer, 225, 230

Duns Scotus, 159, 172, 185

Du Perron, Abraham - Hyacinthe
Anquetil, 199, 213 et seq.

Durazzo, Archbishop of, 151

Dutch attempt to revive the Univer
sity of Louvain, 187 et seq.

Dutch Pope, the. See Adrian VI.,
chap. v.

Dutch Protestants partly responsible
for persecution of Japanese Catho
lics, 312 ; trample on the Cross,
315 ; give help against Christians
in Shimabara, 315

Ealhilda, Queen of Myrgingi, 44

Earle, Mr. J. C. , 293

Eastern Church, Adrian VI. and,

150

East Indian Archipelago, favours

cremation, 22
Eber s " Aegypten," 19

INDEX

363

Ecclesiastes, book of, 187, 195, 196
Echternach. See Dancing proces
sion at.
Education, Catholic higher, and

Dublin Review, 290
Edward the Confessor, 48
Edward III., King, 104 note
Edward IV., King, 104, 114
Edward VI., King, 174, 176, 177
Egidio, Cardinal of Viterbo, 140,

189

Egyptians, burial customs of, 19
Egyptology, 186
Eif el, petition of the parish priests of

the, 346
E/cXaucrav, 18
Elend monk of Fiissen, 96
Elgin, Friars Preachers established

at, by Adrian VI., 150
Elias Levita, 189
Elizabeth, Queen, 174, 178 et seq.
Ellenbog, Prior of Ottobeuren, 96
Emancipation, act of Catholic, 246
Embalming in Egypt, 19 ; in

America, 20
Embassy from Japanese princes to

the Holy See, 307 and note, 330
English Historical Review on the

alleged Papal gift of Ireland to

Henry II., 81 et seq.
English Orientalists at Louvain :

Thomas Wakefield, i94 1 95 I

Robert Sherwood, 195-196
English Pope. (See Adrian IV.)
Ephesus, council of, 235
" Epistola Apologetica Magistri

Pauli de Middleburgo ad Doc-
tores Lovanienses," 190
Eranians and cremation, 8, 9, 13-14
Erasmus, 107, 108, no, 142, 143,

161, 162 et seq., 191-194, 204 note
Erfurt, monastery of St. Peter at,

96; university at, 90, 100, 101,

102

Eskil, Archbishop of Lund, 65, 84
Eton College, 161
Eucharist, Holy, English Lutherans

and the, 166 ; English Zwinglians

and the, 175

Eugenius III., 61 et seq., 87
" European! zation " of Japan, 338-

339

Exposition of bodies among Era
nians and Turanians, 13, 14 ; in

Greater Tibet, 15; in America,

21

Exquiros, Battle of, 123
Eyestein, Prince of Norway, 64

Fagius, 174

Falk, 90 note, 98

Faroe Islands under Metropolitan
See of Nidaros, 64

Feast of the " Finding of the Chris
tians " established by Pope Pius
IX. , 326, 329

Felitzin quoted, 7

Felten, Dr. J., 155 note

Ferdinand, Archduke of Austria,
149

Ferdinand the Catholic, 117

Ferdinand, Duke of Wirtemberg,
194

Fergusson, 7

Fernandez, Joao, 303

Ferrand, Father Claudius, on irre-
ligion in Japan, 340-341

Fetish worship, 187

Feyerabend, Maurus, 96

Ffoulkes, E. S., 288

Finlayson, Mr., 289

Fishacre, Richard, 158

Fisher, Blessed John, 162 et seq.,
165, 170-171

Fitzsimons, Mrs., 289

Fleming, Robert, 161

Flesh-stripping, 5, 14, 20, 23, 24

Florence, Dominican press at, 97 ;
" priest-printers" of, 99 ; repub
lic of, 149

Folklore, 187

Fonte Buono, monastery at, 98

Forcade Abb6 (afterwards Bishop of
Samos and Vicar Apostolic of
Japan), 321, 322, 331 note

Forman, 165

Formby, Father H., 288, 296

Formby, Rev. Matthias, 265

Fornier-Duplon, M., 321

" Fosse," Japanese method of tor
ture, 314

Fowler. john, 199, 208

Fox, Edward, Bishop of Hereford,
168

Foxe s "Book of Martyrs, 168,
207

Fox, Richard, Bishop of Winchester,
163, 192

Franciscans, Adrian VI. and, 150 ;
at Oxford, 158 et seq., 173, 180 ;
in Japan, 310 ; martyrs in Japan,
310, 314, 323

364

INDEX

Francis I., King of France, 123,

125, 127, 130, 134, 139, 148,

192

Frank, 191 note
Franks, 39, 46
Frederick Barbarossa invades Italy,

69 et seq.; struggle with Adrian IV.

as regards homage, 71 et seq.;

crowned at Rome by Pope, 74 ;

quells a riot at Rome, 74 ; renews

his quarrel with Pope, 84 et seq.;

second invasion of Italy,

Frederick, Elector of Saxony, 146
Free, John, 161
Frejus, ancient codex of, 225
French Revolution and Louvain,

187

Freya, 33, 41, 43
Friars and the English Universities,

158
Friars Minor, Church at Louvain,

209 note.

Fribourg University, 154
Frisians, 43

Frees, Father, S.J., 317
Froude, J. A., 169, 170
Fuku, Agatha Kataoka (Sister Mar

garet), 328
Funeral customs :

Bodies buried in sitting or

crouching position, 5, 6, 15,

Burial of animals (favourite

horse, etc.) with bodies, 23
Burial of objects (weapons,
food, etc.) with bodies, 5, 6,
10, ii, 16, 23
Cannibalism, 22, 23
Flesh stripping, 5, 14, 20, 23,

24
Interments beneath the house

floor, 6, 12
of Africa, 22
of America, 20, 21
of Australia, 22
of early Aryan conquerors of

India, 10
of East India Archipelago, 22,

2 3

of Egyptians, 19
of Eranians, 13-14
of Gauls, Germans, Scandi

navians, and Visigoths, 16
of Greece and Rome, 11-12
of Israelites, 17-18
of Little Tibet, 15

Funeral customs continued :
of Phoenicians, 18
Slaughter of attendants (slaves,

etc.), 21, 22, 23
Widow-burning, 10-11, 23
Funeral pyre, building of described
by Apollodorus of Rhodes,
Homer and Virgil, 11 and note
Funus, 9
Furfooz race, 4
Furlong, Father, 251, 253, 258-259,

264, 266, 267
Future life, various burial rites and

the, 24

Fuyu, Maria (Sister Julia), 328
Fylde, 36

Galileo in Japanese controversy, 336
Gamau Udji-sato, daimyo of Aid-

zou, 307 note
Gambara, priestess of the earth, 33,

4i

Gamut, origin of names for the
notes of the, 32 note

Gardiner, Mr. S. R., 177 note, 178
note

Gardiner, Stephen, Bishop of Win
chester, 168, 173, 177

Garibald, Duke of Bavaria, 41, 42,
48

Garibaldi, etymology of name, 48

Garrett, Thomas, of Magdalen Col
lege, Oxford, 167

Gasquet, Abbot, O.S.B., 81, 109
note, 155, 164 note

Gauls, ancient, practise both crema
tion and inhumation, 16

Geerts, Dr., and the siege of Shima-
bara, 315

Genealogical table of royal person
ages mentioned in connection
with Pope Adrian VI., 115 note

Genoa, 136, 144, 149

Gentili, Dr. Aloysius, sketch of his
career, 243-246 ; first impressions
of London, 250; first work in
England, 250-251 ; visits Oxford,
251-252 ; vegetarian and total
abstainer, 254 note ; sudden death
of, 257 ; tribute by Frederick
Lucas, 257-258 ; great mission at
Manchester, 261-268 ; testimonial
from Manchester clergy, 263-265

Geoffrey, Pierre, 223

George, Duke of Montenegro, 97

George, Duke of Saxony, 146

INDEX

365

Gepidae, 38, 39

Gerard, Cardinal, attack on, 68

Germaine, wife of Ferdinand the
Catholic, 119

Germans use cremation, inhuma
tion, and water burial, 16

Gertrude, mother of Adrian VI.,
105, 106

Gesenius, 189 note

" Geshikuya," Catholic hostel for
university students at Tokio, 341

Geudens, Right Rev. Abbot, 57, 58
note

Ghibellines, 145

Giggs, Margaret, 205

Giles, Robert, 209 note

Giles, Wenthana, 209 note

Gillow, Mr. Joseph, 209 note

Ginnell, L., 81

Giovanni d Albona, Canon of
Loreto, 226

Giraldus Cambrensis, So

Girard, Abbe, 322, 323

Girona, Bishop of, 124, 125

Gladstone, Mr. W. E., on the
" Medieval Universities," chap,
vi. passim; 186

Glaire, 225

Godiva, Lady, procession at Coven
try. 255

Godocus Badius, 112

Goerzee, Adrian VI. receives bene
fice of, in

Golanda, 34 and note

Gonell, 163

Gonville Hall, Cambridge, 177

Gordon, General, Cardinal Manning
and, article on, 296-297

Goths, 39

Goto Islands, 327, 332

Gradenigo, Luigi, Venetian ambas
sador, 141

Grammar schools founded in reign
of Edward VI., 212

Grant, Dr., Bishop of Southwark, 271

Greece and Japan, parallels between,
300-301

Greek studies neglected at Univer
sities after Reformation, 182

Green, Rev. George, 265

Green, J. R., 38 note, 157 and note

Greenland under Metropolitan See
of Nidaros, 64

Gregory the Great, Pope, and con
version of the Lombards, 40-41 ;
and Lombard language, 46 ; and

Rogation days, 224 ; and Litany

of Loreto, 230; and heathen

usages, 347

Gregory VII., Pope, 88
Gregory XIII., Pope, and Nicholas

Saunders, 208 ; receives Japanese

embassy, 307; gives Jesuits charge

of Japanese missions, 310
Gregory, XVI., Pope, and the

" Italian missioners," 248-249 ;

erects vicariates in Korea and

Japan, 320,321
Grey, William, 161
Grimm, J., 8, n, 42
Grocyn, 161
Groote, Gerard, 106
Gros, Baron, 322

Grosseteste, Robert, Bishop of Lin-
" coin, 155 note
Gross- Priim pilgrimage to Echter-

nach, 348
" Groto solitos sive Speculum Con-

scientiae" of Arnold of Gheil-

hoven, 95-96
Griindhof, 345
Gryphius, 194
Gubbins, Mr., on the persecution of

Japanese Christians, 313
Gudeoc, 34
Guelphs, 145
Gueric, Abbot, 236
Gue"rin, Admiral, 322
Guido d Arezzo and the names for

the notes of the gamut, 32 note
Gulielmus Parisiensis, 235
Gunther, Abbot of St. Peter s,

Erfurt, 96

Gunthorp, John, 161
Guttenberg, John, 91

Hakodate, Vicariate of, 329, 330
Hall s "Society in the Elizabethan

Age," 183 note
Hamard, 7

Hamburg, Metropolitan See of, 63
Hamilton, Dom Adam, O.S.B., 221
Hammer, Adrian IV. and the build
ing of the cathedral of, 64-65
Hanlon, Bishop, on the funeral

customs of Little Tibet, 15
Hanmer collection of medals at St.
Bede s College, Manchester, 151
note

Harald, King of Norway, 64
Harding, Thomas, Regius Professor
of Hebrew at Oxford, 199, 205-206

366

INDEX

Harper, Father, S.J., 239

Harpsfield, Nicholas, Regius Pro
fessor of Greek, 206

Harris, Alice, 209

Harris, Dorothy, 205 note, 209

Harris, John, secretary to Sir
Thomas More, 205 note, 209

Hartmann, L. M. , 36, 42, 51

Harvest, article in the, on the
" Dancing Procession," 354

Healy, Dr. , Archbishop of Tuam, 297

Hearne, Father Daniel, of St.
Patrick s, Manchester, 267

Hebbelynck, Mgr. Ad., Rector
Magnificus of the University of
Louvain, 200, 219-220 and notes,

221

Hebrew studies in the Middle Ages,
182, 188 et seq.

Hedley, Dr., Bishop of Newport,
and the Dublin Review, 275, 293,
295-298

Hefele, Bishop, 85 note

Heidelberg, 190, 191

Helinandus, 236

Helmechis, 38

He"lyot, 59

Hem, convent at, 96

Hengist and Horsa, 33 note

Henry I., King of England, 54

Henry II. and Adrian IV., 53 ;
sends gifts to Adrian on his elec
tion, 77 ; controversy respecting
gift of Ireland to, 79 et seq.

Henry VI., King, 160

Henry VIII. , King, and Adrian VI.,
126, 127, 128, 130, 148 ; and Eng
lish Universities, 165, 168 et seq.

Henxey Hall, Oxford, 208

Herakle s, 12, 187

Hermann of Nassau, 191

Hermanus Contractus, 235

Hermolaus Barbarus, Venetian Am
bassador, 108

Herodotus, 214

Herschel, Sir John, 159 note

Hertha, Teutonic goddess wor
shipped by Lombards, 30

Heruli, 35, 36

Hetzel, 190 note

Hetzius, Dietrich, Flemish Secre
tary to Adrian VI., 152 note

Heveren (Flanders), 206

Hideyoshi (or Taiko-Sama) issues
Edict against Christians, 307, 309,
343

Hierarchy, creation of Japanese,

329

Higdon, Dr., Dean of Cardinal
College, Oxford, 167

" High Church " system, origin of,
181

Himmelstein, ecclesiastical writer,
223

Hodgkin, T., "Italy and her In
vaders" quoted, 26-27, 30 note,
51 ; on legends Lombard migra
tions, 35, 36 ; rejects the story of
Rosamund, 38 note ; on the Ger
manic origin of Langobards, 42
et seq.

Hoffmann, Professor, on the work
of Portuguese missions in Japan,
316-317

Hofler on Pope Adrian VI., 120
note, 130 note, 150 note, 153

Holstein, 36

Holy House of Loreto, 225-227

Holy See allows English Catholics
to attend the Universities, 154 ;
letter of Leo XIII. , "Ad Anglos,"

J 54
Homage, Papal right to, recognised

by German law, 72 ; submitted

to by Frederick Barbarossa, 72

et seq.
Homer on building of funeral pyre,

ii

Hondemius, Johannes, 235
Honorius of Autun, 236
Honours, list of Oxford, 201 and

note
Horse or hounds, burying favourite,

2 3
Hosius, Cardinal Stanislaus (Papal

Legate at Council of Trent), 207
Huber, 176

Hugh of St. Victor, 235
Hugo, Abbot Charles Louis, 57 and

note, 58 and note, 59
" Humanism," 161, 164
Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester,

gifts to Oxford University Library,

2II-2I2

"Hundred Years War" between
Empire and Papacy, 74-75

Huns, 26

Hutchison, Father, on the antiquity
of the Litany of Loreto, 224

Hutton, Father, 251

Huxley, Professor^ 186

Hyde, Thomas, Orientalist, 214

INDEX

367

Ibor, 33 and note, 34

Iceland under Metropolitan See of

Nidaros, 64 ; first printing-press

in, 99

Idiota, 235, 236
leyasu, lounder of the Tokugawa

Dynasty, 301, 311, 313, 343
Illustrated Catholic Missions, 15,

3 2 9. 33 2

Imbert, Mgr., 320

Immaculate Conception, Adrian IV.
and the, 88

Incas of ancient Peru, 20

Indifference, religious, in Japan,
339-34

Indulgences denounced at Cam
bridge, 165

Inge, Prince of Norway, 64

Ingoldstadt Prayer-Book and the
invocation "Auxilium Christian-
orum," 228

Ingvaeones, 45

Inhumation practised universally by
Palaeolithic races, 4 ; prevalent
among Neolithic races, 5 ; the
only method employed during
the "Silver Age" in Spain, 6;
abandoned by Eranians, 9 ; prior
to cremation among Greeks, 12 ;
practised in Rome, 12 ; employed
by Chinese, 14 ; practised by
Greeks, Germans, Scandinavians,
and Visigoths, 16 ; Semites essen
tially a burying race, 16 et seq. ;
the Jews bury their dead, 17, 18 ;
the exclusive funeral rite of the
Egyptians, 19 ; in America, 20 ;
practically universal in Africa, 21,
22 ; general conclusions, 24, 25

Innocent II., Pope, 72

Inquisition, 189, 190 note; in Japan
ese controversy, 336

Institute of Charity : foundation
and constitutions, 241-243 ; and
Prior Park College, 248, 250 ;
Pope Gregory XVI. blesses the
English missioners, 248-249 ; in
structions of Rosmini to English
missioners, 249 ; first work in
England, 250-252 ; four great
spiritual works, 252-253 ; the
work of the "Itinerant Mission
aries," 253-255 ; chronological
catalogue of missions, 255-256 ,
death of Dr. Gentili, 257-258 ;
sketch of career of Father Fur

long, 258-260 ; further develop
ments, 260

Interdict, Rome placed under, by
Adrian IV., 68

Ireland : alleged grant to Henry II.,
53 ; statement of the controversy,
79 et seq. ; state of Ireland in
Adrian IV. s time, 82 et seq. ;
Cardinal Wiseman, suggestions
for articles in Dublin Review on,
281-282

Ireland, quoted on, Richard Fish-
acre, 158

Irish College, Rome, Dr. Gentili
and the, 245

Irish Immigration and the "Second
Spring," 240

Irish Monthly. See Russell, Father
Matthew, S.J.

Iron Crown, Frederick Barbarossa
receives, 69

Irreligion in Japan, 336-341

Isabella, Infanta, 116

Isidore of Tliessalonia, 236

Islam, 89

Isle of Man transferred from pro
vince of York to that of Nidaros,
64 <

Israelites and inhumation, 17, 18

" Italian," meaning of the term, 27

Ives, Dr. (converted Bishop of the
Episcopal Church of America), 293

Janssen, 90 note, 100, 102

Japan : the Catholic Church in

I. The ancient Church, 300-
318 ; interest of the subject, 300-
301 ; discovery of Japan, 302 ;
work of St. Francis Xavier, 302-
304 ; why St. Francis Xavier left
Japan, 305 ; success of Jesuit
missions, 306-307 ; Japanese
Embassy to Pope Gregory X III.,
307 ; sketch of Japanese Govern
ment, 308 ; Hideyoshi perse
cutes the Christians, 309 ;
various religious orders in
Japan, 310 ; first martyrs, 310-
311 ; mistaken zeal of native
Christian princes, 311 ; peace
under leyasu, 311 ; cause of the
great persecution, 312 ; suffer
ings of the Christians, 312-315 ;
massacre of Shimabara, 315 ;
extinction of Christianity in
Japan, 315, 316 ; labours of

368

INDEX

early missioners in behalf of
philology and literature, 316-
3i8

II. The Second Spring, 318-
331 ; " Socie te des Missions
Etrangeres," 319 ; Japanese
wrecked off Philippines, 319-
320 ; Missioners get to Liu Kiu
Islands, 320-322; United States
get admission to Japanese ports,
322 ; Missions opened at Yoko
hama and Nagasaki, 323 ;
canonization of twenty - six
Japanese martyrs, 323 ; the
finding of the Christians," 323-
326 ; overthrow of the Shogun-
ate, 327 ; fresh persecution, 327-

328 ; introduction of nuns, 328 ;
native priests and nuns, 328-

329 ; development of ecclesias
tical government, 329 ; erection
of Heirarchy, 329, 330 ; ameni
ties between Mikado and Holy
See, 330 ; list of bishops, 331

III. Future of the Church,
33 2 -343 1 recent returns, 332,
333 ; four hindrances, 333 ;
rivalry of the sects, 333-335;
the anti-Catholic press, 335-
337 ; materialism and indiffer-
entism, 338-341 ; hope for the
future, 341-343

Japanese practise cremation, 8

Jars, funeral, 6, 17, 18

Jealousies of religious orders in the

East, 310
Jehu, 69

Jenks, Rowland, 180
Jeremiah, 17
Jesuits, 1 80 ; in Japan, chap. xii.

passim

Jesus College, Cambridge, 160
Jevons, Mr. F. B., 25
Jevons, Professor W. S., on Roger

Bacon, 159 note
Jewell, Bishop, 177
Jimmu, founder of the present

Japanese dynasty, 308
Jingo, Empress, 301
Joannes de Westphalia (John

Wessel of Groningen), 190 and

note
Johan, son of King Sverker of

Sweden, 65

Johannes, Geometra, 236
John of Austria, 228

John IV., Duke of Brabant, 187,

2CI

John of Salisbury, 67, 78, 79, 80,

81

John of St. Giles, 158
John XII. , Pope, 133
John XXII, Pope, 80
Jolliffe, Henry, Dean of Bristol,

209 note
Jones, Sir William, Orientalist,

216
Jordan, Blessed, General of the

Dominicans, 158
Joseph II., 348
Journal of the German Oriental

Society quoted, 316-317
Julius II., Pope, 114
Jungmann, Professor B., 81
Justinus Michoviensis on the Litany

of Loreto, 223, 233

Kagoshima, 303

Karlby, great burial ground at, 5

Kelly, 81

Kempe, John, Archbishop of Can

terbury, 211
Kempe, Thomas, Bishop of London,

211

Kilwardby, Cardinal Robert, Arch

bishop of Canterbury, 158, 185
King s College, Cambridge, 160
Kingship among Lombards and

Anglo-Saxons elective, 47-48
Kiriskitan Bugyo or Japanese

Christian inquisitor, 314
Kissinger, Sixtus, first introduced

printing into Naples, 98
Knights Hospitallers of St. John,

76, 144 et seq.

Knoll on the Litany of Loreto, 233
Ko, Augustine, 321
Koburger s press, ico
Koeckebacker, 315

Koegel, 37
Koelhoff,

chronicle of, 92
Kolb on the Litany of Loreto,

233

Koppes, Mgr., Bishop of Luxem

burg, 352

Kraus, Professor, 143 note
Kuenen, 186
Kumbha (funeral urn), n

Ladak (Little Tibet), Bishop Han-
Ion on the funeral customs of,

INDEX

369

Lady Margaret Chair of Divinity at
Cambridge, 162

Laguerre, Admiral, 322

Lake Dwellers, 4, 5, 7

Lambeth, 166

Lamissio, legend of, 34, 41

Lamy, Professor, T. J., no note,
193, 200, 219-220 and note, 297

Laneau, Monsignor, 319

Lanfranc, 49

Langius, 193

Langton Stephen, Archbishop of
Canterbury, 155 note

Language of Lombards, 45 et seq.;
Japanese, 318

Lanigan, 81

" Lankosargi," 29

Lantenai, Abbey of, 97

Latham, Dr., 37, 45

Latimer, Hugh, Bishop of Worces
ter, 166, 176

Latimer, William, 161

Laucaigne, Abbe", 327, 331 note

Laud, Archbishop, 181

Laudabiliter, so-called Bull, 79, 81,
82 note, 83 note

Launay, Abbe", 319 notes: 324-326,

T 343 .

Laurentms, 226

Laurentius Holbeccius, Hebrew

dictionary of, 195
Laws of the Twelve Tables, 12
Layton Dr. , 172
" Leabher Breac," 8th century

litany of Our Lady, 225, 231
Lee, Dr. F. G. , and the invocations

of the Litany of Loreto, 234-235
Legh, Dr., 172
Legnano, Battle of, 87
Leibnitz, 341
Leicester, Robert Dudley, Earl of,

Chancellor of Oxford, 180, 181
Leipsic, "priest-printers" at, 99
Leland, 183
Lent (the time of sadness), kept by

the survivors of early Japanese

Christianity, 325

Leonhard, Abbot, of Ottobeuren, 96
Leonora, Infanta, 116
Leo X., Pope, 120, 124, 140, 142,

143 and note, 189
Leo XIII., 55, 76, 143, 208 note,

222, 232 and note, 233, 329
Lepanto, Battle of, 228, 232
Lepitre, Abb6 A., on Adrian VI.,

112 note, 120 note, 153

Leprosy in Japan, 332

Lerinda, "priest-printers" at, 99

Leturdu, Abbe", 321

Lever, 176

Lewis, Mr. David, 293

Lewis, Mr., estimate of Roger Bacon,
159 note

Libois, Abbe", 322

Lichfield, Archdeacon Richard, 211

Liege, 152 note

Lienhardt, Abbot, 57

Ligneul, Abbe", on the anti-Catholic
press of Japan, 335 ; replies to
Professor Tetsujiro, 337 ; his work
prohibited, 337 ; value of his work,
338

L Imolese, 224 note

Linacre, Thomas, 161, 203

Lincoln, Bishop of, and the Chan
cellorship of Oxford University,

.157

Lincoln College, Oxford, 160

Lincoln, Robert, 220

Lingard, Dr., 81, 286

Linkoping, Synod of, 65

Litanies, four allowed for public reci
tations, 222; the term "litany,"
223, 231

"Little Bilney," 165-166

Liu-Kiu Islands attached to Vicar-
iate of Korea, 320-321 ; attempts
to open them up for commerce,

320 ; Abbe* Forcade reaches Nafa,

321 ; terrible sufferings of mis
sionaries, 322-323

Liutprand, 32, 40, 43, 48

Lochorst, 151

Lockhart, Father, 239, 241 note, 242
and note, 244, 246, 247, 249, 252,
299

Logrono, 124

Lollards, 166

Lombards or Langobards, a savage
horde from Pannonia, 26 ; name
Germanic, 28 ; closely connected
with Anglo-Saxons, 28 ; Roman
civilization and culture have pre
vailed among them, 28-29 < clas
sical Roman writers and early
history of, 29-30 ; native legends
and early history of, 30, 32 et seq. ;
Paul, the deacon s "History of
the Lombards," 31, 32; origin of
name Langobardi, 33 ; had serf
population, 33, 34 ; often known as
" Bardi," 36; meaning of word
24

370

INDEX

" Langobard," 37 ; all Germanic
traces in Italy not Lombardic, 39 ;
Lombard influence not limited to
modern Lombardy, 40 ; two cen
turies of Lombard supremacy, 40 ;
conversion of the Lombards, 40-
41 ; wealth of folk legends, 41-42 ;
probably of Low German origin,
42 et seq. ; the Lombard language,
45 etseq. ; the political institutions,
47 et seq. ; dress of, 44, 47 ; in
fluence on architecture, commerce,
and science, 49-50 ; modern Lom
bardy, 50 ; bibliography of, 51

Lombard Street, 27, 49

London, first printing-press in, 92

Longland, Bishop of Lincoln, 168

Lope de Vega, 92

Lopez, Father, S. J., 317

Lorenz, Bishop of Wiirzburg, 93

Lorenzo d Aquila, 98

Loreto, History of the Litany of, its
unique position among Catholic
devotions, 222-223 I meaning and
history of the word " litany," 223-
224 ; opinions as to the age of the
litany of Loreto, 224 - 225, 237 ;
ancient litanies to Our Lady, 225-
226 ; uncertainty as to the existence
of our present litany before the
latter half of sixteenth century, 226-
228 ; probably officially recognised
in Rome after the Battle of Le-
panto, 228-229 ; two theories as to
the origin of our present litany,
229-230 ; authorship of the existing
litany, 230-231 ; summary of the
investigation, 231-232 ; history of
certain additions to the litany,
232 ; analysis of the invocations
in our litany, 233-235 ; table
showing patristic and Scriptural
sources of the invocations, 235-

236 ; opinion of Fr. De Santi, S.J.,

237 ; books to be consulted, 237
Lorraine, Duke of, 58 note
Lothair, Emperor, 72

Loudon, Dr., 167, 172
Loughborough, Leicestershire, 251,

2 S3

Louis, King of Hungary, 149
Louis VII., King of France, 62,

87

Louis XI. , King of France, 107
Louvain and Oxford. See Oxford

and Louvain.

Louvain, two English scholars and
the beginning of Oriental studies
in. See "Oriental Studies in
Louvain."

Louvain, University of, 104, 105,
107 ; discipline, 107 ; faculties,
108 ; and Renascence, 108 ; other
references, 150, 154, 166, 182 note.
See also chaps, vii. and viii. passim.

Louvet quoted on persecution in
Japan, 314, 328, 329, 343

Low German character of the Lom
bards proved. 43-44

Liibeck, " priest-printers" at, 99

Luca di Penna, 86

Lucas, Claudius, 58 note

Lucas, Mr. Frederick, on Dr. Gen-
tili, 257-258

Lucca, Republic of, 149

Lucius II., Pope, 62 note

Lucretia, 223

Lund, Metropolitan See of, 63

Luther, 127, 139, 145, 165, 166, 168,
189, 190

Lutheranism at the Universities, 165
et seq.

Luther legend, 90, 100 et seq.

Luxemburg, Grand Duchy of, 344

Lycurgus condemns cremation, 12

Lyly, William, 161

Lynch, Archdeacon, 80

Lyons, Carthusian Monastery at,

Macarius, monk of Cettinje, 97

Macerata Prayer-Book and invoca
tion, "Auxilium Christianorum,"
228, 230 note

MacGeoghegan, 81

MacMurrough, King of Leinster,

83

Maeda, Father, on the needs of the
Church in Japan, 336, 338, 341-

343
Magdalen College, Oxford, 160, 161,

174, 175

Magdeburg, Premonstratensian con
vent at, 98

" Magistri Comacini," 49

Magi, tradition respecting, 214 ;
bodies transferred from Milan, 85
note

Mainz, 92, 99, 146

Makpelah, burying - place of the
kings, 18

Mallet, 174

INDEX

37 1

Malone, Father Sylvester, 81, 83,

8g

Malta, 145
Manchester Guardian quoted, 52,

156

Manning, Cardinal, 239, 271, 286,
288, 290, 294, 296

Manuel, Don Juan, Imperial Am
bassador at Rome, 132, 133

Marathon, 12

Marco Polo, 302

Marforio, statute of, 142

Margaret, Countess of Richmond,
162

Margaret of Austria, 115

Margaret, Princess of York, 104,
105, in

Maria, Infanta, 116

Marienthal, 96 note

Marius, 13

Market Weighton Reformatory,
work of printing-press at, 260

Marmery, J. Vellin, 159 note

Mamas on religion in Japan, 343

Marseilles, 136

Marsh, Adam, O.S.F., 159

Marshall, Mr. T. W., 279, 288,

2 93

Martin, Abbe", 155 note
Martinez, Pedro, S.J., first resident

Bishop of Japan, 311, 331 note
Martin V., Pope, 187, 199, 201
Martorelli on the date of the Litany

of Loreto, 226
Martyrs, Japanese, number of,

314, 315 ; canonization of, 323,

327

Mary, Queen, 174, ij6 et seq.
" Mater Boni Consilii," origin of

invocation, 232
Materialism in Japan, 338-341
Matthaeus Hadrianus, 191, 193 et

seq.

Matthew Paris, 80, 158
Mauringa, 33, 34, 36, 41
Maximilian, Emperor, 115, 349
May devotions introduced by Fathers

of Charity, 253, 258
McCarthy, Mr. James, on funeral

jars in Siam, 6 note
Meaney, Rev. Joseph, 265
Mechlin, 115, 116, 188, 206
Medals of Adrian VI., 151 note
Medici, Cardinal, 129
Melanchthon, 168, 172, 174, 193
Melchior, Abbot, 96

Mendez Pinto, 302

Merry, Dr. , Rector of Lincoln Col
lege, Oxford, 211

Merton College, Oxford, 159, 180,
206

" Metalogicus " of John of Salis
bury, 78, 79, 81

Methodists in Japan, 334

Metz, "priest-printers" at, 99

Mey, Vice-Chancellor of Cambridge
University, 181

Mexicans practise cremation, 8

Midon, Mgr. , Bishop of Osaka, 330,
331 note

Migne, Abbe", 299

Milan, Duke of, 149

Milan stands out against Frederick
Barbarossa, 86 ; monastic presses
near, 97 ; the secular " priest-
printers " of, 99

Mill, John Stuart, and the Dublin
Review, 290

Mirama, convent at, 98

Mirandola, Pico della, 189

Missions Catholiques of Lyons
quoted, 300-301

Missions, preaching of popular, in
England, 253

Missions, remarkable, given by
Fathers of Charity (1844), Coven
try, 255 ; (1846), Seel Street,
Liverpool, 255-256 ; (1845-1846),
Manchester, 261-268

Mivart, Mr. St. George, and the
Dublin Review, 293, 296

Modrone, 50

Molanus, 104 note, 206 note, 208

Moller, 42

Monasteries, suppression of the, its
effects on the Universities, 172 et
seq.

Mongolians, 14

Monro, Professsor D. B., Vice-
Chancellor of University of Ox
ford, 197

Mont-Ce"sar, castle on, 104, 116
note

Monte Cassino, Abbey of, 31, 32

Montpellier, University of, 177

Montserrat, monastic press at, 98

Monza, 40

Morales, Sebastian, S.J., Bishop of
Japan, 331 note

Moran, Cardinal, 81, 297

Moravia, 36

More, Sir Thomas, 161, 162, 192
24 2

372

INDEX

note, 203, 204 note, 205 and note,
206, 209

Morice, Father, O.M.I., on "Car
rier Sociology and Mythology,"
21 note

Moringus, 104 note, 109

Moroni, 224, 225

Morris, Father John, S.J., 280, 288

Morris, Father W. B., of the Ora
tory, 8 1

Motais, Abbe", 297

"Mounds" of America, 4, 19-20

Moyes, James, Canon, and the
Dublin Review, 275, 298-299

Much on origin of Langobards, 42,

43

Mugheir, burial-ground at, 16
Miihlerthal, the, 344, 345
M tiller, Professor Max, 9, 186
Miiller, Sophus, 25
Mullinger, 155, 163, 171, 177, 182
Muratori, 78, 223 note
" Murder as a Fine Art," i
Murray, Dr., 286, 293
Murray, Mr. D., 310 note, 312, 313,

S 1 ^ 343
Murri, Vicenzo, on the date of the

Litany of Loreto, 226
Mutsuhito, Mikado, 327, 330

Na9us, 13

Nafa, capital of Liu-Kiu Islands,

321
Nagasaki, 306, 309, 312, 322-326,

329-331

Namur, monastery at, 98
Naples, first introduction of print
ing into, 99
Napoleon I., 85, 145
Narses, 38
Navarre, attempted conquest by

Francis I. of France, 123
Neanderthal race, 3
Nego, Girolamo, 142
Neolithic Age, 4, 5, 7
Nepi, 71, 73
Nepotism, suppressed by Adrian

VI., 140
Neve, Professor Felix, 182 note, 188,

190, 192 note, 195, 196
New College Oxford, 206, 208
Newman, Cardinal, 238-241, 248,

252, 253, 268, 279, 281, 286, 288
Nice, 124, 136
Nicholas, Auguste, on the antiquity

of the Litany of Loreto, 224

Nicholas, Cardinal of Aragon, 78

note

Nicholson, Mr. E. B. , 213 note
Nicolaus de Lyra, 189
Nidaros, erection of Metropolitan

See of, 64
Nobunaga and Christianity, 306,

37, 39
Nonconformists in England before

Catholic revival, 247
Norgate, Miss Kate, 81, 83 and

note
Northcote, Dr., on the antiquity of

the Litany of Loreto, 224
Norway, Cardinal Nicholas Break-

speare s mission to, 63 et seq.
Notre Dame, Church of (Antwerp),

Adrian VI., Dean of, in
Nuns sent to Japan, 328
Nuremberg, printing-press at, 92 ;

Diet of, 147

Oakeley, Canon, 280, 288, 293, 295

Obatala, 187

Ober Ammergau, Passion Play at,

344

Occo, Adolf, 93

O Connell, Daniel, 267 ; and the
Dublin Review, 269, 273, 276-278,
283, 289

Oem, Dr. Florencius, Syndic of
Utrecht, 126

Oesch, G. A., and musical setting
of Litany of Loreto, 234 and
note

O Hagan, Mr. John (afterwards Mr.
Justice), 287

Order of the Child Jesus send nuns
to Japan, 328

Orientalism among Catholic scholars
before the Reformation, 188 et
seq.

Orientalists, International Congress
of, at Geneva, 307 note, 318

Oriental studies in Europe, what
they owe to Du Perron, 213 et
seq.

Oriental studies in Louvain : Orien
talism and theology, 186 et seq. ;
Oriental studies always held a
high place at Louvain, 187 ; Orien
talism among Catholic scholars
before Reformation, 188-189 ; be
gan in the printer s office, 189 et
seq. ; earliest work in the lecture-
room : Matthaeus Hadrianus, 191

INDEX

373

et seq. ; foundation of the Trilin
gual College, 191 et seq. ; first
teaching under the auspices of the
Faculty of Arts, 193 ; two English
men hold chair of Hebrew, 194-

196 ; Robert Wakefield, 194-195 ;
Robert Sherwood, 195-196

Origen, 235

Origo gentis Langobardorum, 30

Orkneys transferred from province
of York to that of Nidaros, 64

Orlando di Lasso and the Litany of
Loreto, 230 note

O Rourke, King of Breiffny, 83

Ortiz, provisor of the Bishop of
Calahora, 124

Oscott College, 238, 271

Osouf, Mgr., received by Mikado,
330, 331 note ; on Japanese press,
335-338 ; on religious indifference
in Japan, 340

Ostia, 137

Ostrogoths, 26

Ottobeuren, Abbey of, 96

Oviedo, Antonio, S.J., Bishop of
Japan, 331 note

Oxford and Louvain : address of
the University of Louvain at ter
centenary of Bodleian Library,

197 et seq. ; Oxford two centuries
older than Louvain, 200-201;
the influence of the Church on the
development of both Universities,
201-202 ; like Oxford, Louvain
was a University of many colleges,

202 ; connections between them,

203 et seq. ; Erasmus closely
connected with both, 203 ; Oxford
men who found refuge at Louvain
at the Reformation, 204 et seq. ;
history of the Bodleian, 209-213 ;
Avestic studies at Louvain owe
much to the Bodleian Library,
213 et seq. ; the labours of Du
Perron, 213-218 ; kindness of the
Bodleian librarians to Louvain
scholars, 220-221

Oxford, first printing-press at, 92 ;
Dr. Gentili at, 251-252

Oxford, University of, 107, 156, 157
and note, 158 ; the " New Learn
ing" and, 161 ; work of Church
men at Oxford, 163 ; epidemics
at, 164 ; Lutheranism and, 167
et seq. ; Royal divorce and, 168
ct seq. ; effect of the suppression

of the monasteries on the, 172 et
seq. ; Chancellorship of Bishop
Gardiner, 173 ; Peter Martyr
lectures at, 175 ; Catholic party
during Elizabeth s reign at, 178 et
seq.

Pace, Richard, sent by Henry VIII.
on mission to Rome, 132

Pacheco, Dona Maria, 122

Pacomius, 97

Padua, University of, 177, 191

Pagani, Father, Rosminian, 244,
249-251, 254, 255, 261

Pagi, 66

Palaeolithic races, 3-5, 19

Palermo, 75

Palestrina and the Litany of Loreto,
230 note

Pallu, Mgr., 319

Palmer, J. F., 286

Pampeluna, siege of, 123

Panizzi praises article on Dublin
Review, 279

Pannartz, Arnald, 94

Papal infallibility and Dublin Re
view, 290, 292

Paquot, 193

Paris, University of, 57, 107, 157
note, 158, 170 et seq., 177, 190,
192, 201-203

Parker, shipowner, 208

Parkinson, Mgr. Henry, Rector of
Oscott College, 271

Parkinson, Dr. Robert, 208

Parma, Carthusian press at, 97

Parsis of Bombay, 13, 215

Paschal II., Pope, 63

Pasquino, statue of, 129, 142

Passionists, congregation of the,
243, 253, 258

Pastor, Dr. Ludwig, 128 note, 143
note, 164 note

Patras, 59

Paul II., Pope, 93

Paul the Deacon quotes De Lango-
bardorum gestis, 30 ; sketch of his
life, 31 ; connection with St.
Bede, 31-32 ; and origin of names
of the notes of the gamut, 32
note preserves the old saga of
Lombard migrations, 32, et seq.,
42 note; on similarity of Lom
bard and Anglo - Saxon dress,
44, 47 ; and Lombard songs,
46

374

INDEX

Paulsen, 157 note

Pavia, 40

Peacham, 183

Peckham, Archbishop, 159

Perelli, John, gives titles of two dif
ferent litanies of Our Lady, 227

Perne, 177

Perry, Commodore, 322

Persecutions in Japan, first persecu
tion probably due to Spaniards,
310 ; second due in great part to
English and Dutch, 311-316;
third (1868), 327-328

Peter Baptist, Father, O.S.F., 310

Peter de Valence, 165

Peterhouse, Cambridge, 159

Peter Lombard, 27, 49, 112 note, 172

Peter Martyr, 121, 174, 175, 177, 204

Peter of Blois, 77

Peter, Prefect of Rome, and Arnaldo
da Brescia, 70

Peter s pence first raised in Norway
by Nicholas Breakspeare, 64;
Henry II. promises an annual
tribute of, 82

Peter the Patrician, 30

Petitjean, Abbe" Bernard, 324-326 ;
(afterwards Bishop of Myrophitus
and Vicar Apostolic of Japan),
329, 331 note

Petre, Hon. and Rev. W. (after
wards Lord), 296

Petrus Cellensis, 235, 236

Pfulf, Father, S.J., 81

Philip II., 189, 205

Philippus, Abbot, 236

Phoenicians, burial customs of, 18

Phos-spun (hereditary undertaker),

15

Pictet, Adolphe, " Origines Indo-
Europe"ennes " cited, 8 ; on burial
rites in pre-Vedic times, 11-12
Pied Piper of Hamelin, 348*
" Pietas Oxoniensis" quoted, 210,

211, 212, 221

Pietro da Pisa, 97

Pilkington, Bishop of Durham, 179

Pineda, 196

Pirckheimer, 191

Pitra, Cardinal, 346, 347

Pitts, 196

Pius V., Pope, and the title, " Aux-

ilium Christianorum," 228, 229,

232
Pius IX., Pope, 232, 323, 325, 326,

327. 3 2 9

Pius X., Pope, and Adrian VI., 153
Place names, note on spelling of

Japanese, 303 note
Plague in Rome (1523), 138, 149
Plantin, 189
Platasa, 12
Platform burial among the Sioux

Indians, 21
Pliny, 12, 35 note
Plochmann and Irischer edition of

Luther s works quoted, 102
Pluralities, Adrian VI. and, m

et seq.

Plutarch on inhumation, 12
Pole, Cardinal, 178
Political institutions of Lombards,

47 et seq.

Pollard, Professor, 146
" Polycraticus" of John cf Salisbury,

67, 78, 79
Pondicherry, 214

Poor scholars at English Univer
sities, 160, 161, 173, 183 et seq. ;

at Louvain, 202
Pope, the survivors of early Japanese

Christianity inquire after, 325
Pope, Sir Thomas, 177
Porto Marino, 136
" Postillas," 102

Potken, Adam, priest of Xanten, 101
Power, Senator (of Ottawa), 297
Prague, University of, 107, 202
Prasavya rite, 10
Predil Pass, Lombard trek across

the, 40
Premonstratensians, connection of

Nicholas Breakspeare with, 57 et

seq.
Press, anti-Catholic, in Japan, 335-

338

Press, Oriental, at Louvain, 190
Printing-press. See " The Church

and the Printing-press": in the

fifteenth century, 92-93, 94 ; much

used by religious orders, 94 et seq.
Prior Park College, the Fathers of

Charity and, 248, 250, 259
Processions with litanies, rise of, 224
Procopius, 35
Protestantism and the Universities,

165 et seq.
Protestant missions in Japan, 334-

335

Priim, procession at, 348
Ptolemy, 30, 43
Public schools and Universities, 161

INDEX

375

Pulleyn, Robert, Archdeacon of
Rochester and the first English
Cardinal, 62 note

Puritanism, 178, 180 et seq.

Pusstas of Hungary, 36

Pyramids, 19

Pythagoreans bury their dead, 12

Quakers (American) in Japan, 334
Quarant Ore introduced into Eng
land, 253, 258

Queen s College, Cambridge, 160
Quin, Mr. Michael J., first editor of
the Di&lin Review, 273, 275, 276
Quirino, Vincenzo, 116

Raby, Mr. Richard, on Adrian IV.,
S3. 67, 89

" Race chemistry," 27

" Race philosophy," 27

Raffaele and Leo X., 143 note

Ralph de Diceto, 80

Ramridge, Dr. John (Joannes Ra
in i^er), 206

Ramsgate, plundering of monastic
libiary at, 195

Rastell, Elizabeth, sister of Sir
Thomas More, 206

Rastell, John, printer and lawyer,

2C6

Rasell, Judge William, 205-207
Ratehis, King of the Lombards, 31,

58 note

Rrtcliffe College, Leicester, 260
Rivenna, Adrian IV. and Frederick
II. quarrel about the archbishopric
of, 86

Reform, Adrian VI. and, 139 et seq.
Reformation and English Univer
sities, "vide Universities, English,
and the Reformation, chap, vi.,

IS4-I8S
Reform, University, in modern times

a reversion to pre- Reformation

ideals, 184-185
Regesta of Adrian VI., loss of, 152

note
Regina Cceli, Abbey of, Louvain,

104
" Regina Sacratissimi Rosarii,"

origin of invocation, 232
" Regini sine labe original! con-

cepta," origin of the invocation,

232
Reinhold von Tassel (Chancellor of

Frederick Barbarossa), 85 and note

Religion and politics, relation of,

Dublin Review and, 290
Religious orders and printing-press,

94 et seg.
Renan, 186
Renascence, Adrian VI. and, 142

et seq,

Rendal, Professor, 9
Renzano, 151 note
Republican party at Rome struggle

with Adrian IV., 67-68 ; invite

Frederick Barbarossa to Rome,

69
Retreats in colleges according to

method of St. Ignatius, 250
Reubner, Ernestus, 57
Reuchlin, 189, 191, 194
Reusens, Professor E. H. J., 112-

113 note, 116 note, 153
Revolution and Louvain University,

202

Rheims, English scholars at, 181
Rhodes, Island of, invested by Turks,

144 ; capitulation, 145
Ribaud, Abbe", on parallels between

Japan and Greece, 300-301
Richard, Abbot of St. Alban s, 56
Richard of St. Lawrence, 236
Richard of St. Victor, 236
Richards, Mr., printer, 277
Richardson and Son, publishers,

277, 283
Ridel, Mgr., Vicar Apostolic of

Korea, 330 note

Riera, Father Raffaele, S.J., 226, 229
Riesi, 153
Rig Veda, on funeral ritual of early

Aryan conquerors of India, 10-11 ;

rite for inhumation and cremation,

11-12

Rimmer, Rev. John, 265
Rinolfi, Father, 251 and note
Robertson, Canon James Craigie,

historian, 121

Robertson, Professor J. B., 281, 286
Rodgers, John, 177 note
Rodriguez, Father Joao, S.J., 317
Rogation Days, origin of, 224
Rogerus de Insula, Chancellor of

Diocese of Lincoln, 210
Roger Wendover, 80
Roland, Cardinal (afterwards Pope

Alexander III.), 85
Roman collar introduced into Eng
land by Fathers of Charity, 253
note

37 6

INDEX

Romanes Lecture, 1892 : Mr. W. E.
Gladstone on the History of Uni
versities, chap. vi. passim

Rome, introduction of printing, 94;
convent of Sant" Eusebio, 98 ;
progress of printing at Rome
during fifteenth century, 99 ;
"priest-printers" at, 99

Roncaglia, Diet of, 69, 86

Rosamund, story of, 38 and notes,
39 and notes, 42

Roskell, Rev. Richard B. (afterwards
second Bishop of Nottingham),
265

Rosmini-Serbati, Antonio, founds
Institute of Charity, 241-243 ; in
terested in conversion of England,
243 ; accepts Aloysius Gentili, 245 ;
instructions to Fathers going to
England, 249

Rosse, Lord, telescope of, 286

Rostock, 95

Rota, supreme tribunal of Rome, 138

Rothari, laws of King, 30, 40, 43, 48

Rousseau, Abbe", on conversion of
the Airms, 333

Royal Library of Dublin, 225

Rudolf, Bishop of Scherenberg, 93

Rugians, 39

Rugiland, 34, 36

Rupert, Abbot, 235

Russell, Dr. Charles (President of
Maynooth College) and the Dublin,
Review, 285-286, 293

Russell, Father Matthew, S.J., on
the history of the Dublin Review.
See chap. xi. passim

Russell of Killowen, Lord, 287

Russian Church, Orthodox, 89 ; in
Japan, 333-334

Ryder, Father, of the Oratory, 239

Salerno, University of, 156

San Paolo fuori le Mura, 137

"Santa Casa," 226

Santa Maria dell Anima, Church

of, at Rome, 151
Sanuto, Marino, Venetian historian,

I S I

S apareu ( professional corpse-
butcher), 24

Saragossa, 136

Saraph, note on its meaning in
i Kings xxxi., vv. 12, 13, and Jer.
xxxiv., v. 5, 17

Satow, Mr. Ernest, 318

Saul, 17

Saunders, Nicholas, Regius Pro
fessor of Canon Law at Oxford,
199, 207

Sauren, Herr Josef, on (he Litany
of Loreto, chap. ix. passim

Savelli, Paolo, Prince of Albano,
226, 229, 236

Savona, Augustinian convent at, 97
Adrian VI. at, 136

Saxons, 39, 43

Sayce, Rev. Professor, 9

Scandanan, hie cf, 32, 35

Scandinavia, 35 and note", 40, 51

Scandinavian Church and Cardinal
Nicholas Breakspeare, 52, 62-66 ;
in Japan, 334

Scandinavians use cremation, in
humation, and water buriil, 16

Sceafa, Anglo-Saxon hero, 44

Schafarik, 97

Schenkbecker, 99

Scherer, 224

Schiner, Cardinal, 130

Schlegel, Professor, 307 note

Schmidt, Lud., 36

Schmitt Leonhard, 37, 42

Schneider-Beringer, 224

Schrader, O., " Prehistoric Antiqui
ties of the Aryan Peoples," 7,25 ;
on the Lake Dwellers, 7 ; on Cre
mation and inhumation in Vedic
times, 11-12

Schussenried, monastic press at, 98

Scipios, 12

Scoringa, 33, 35

Scott, Dr. Cuthbert, Bishop of
Chester, 209 note

Second Spring: A Forgotten Chaptei
of the : origin of the phrase, 238 ;
influence of Oxford movement on,
238-239 ; influence of Irish immi
gration on, 240 ; influence of the
" Italian Mission," 240; Rosmini s
Institute of Charity" (foundation
and constitutions of), 241-243;
continental interest in the conver
sion of England, 243 ; the career
of Dr. Gentili, 243-246 ; state of
Catholics in England previous to
1835, 246-247 ; synchronisms be
tween the work of Newman and
Rosmini, 248 ; the coming of the
" Italian mission," 248-250 ; first
work of the Rosminians, 250-255 ;
chronological catalogue of mis-

INDEX

377

sions given by Fathers of Charity,
255-256 ; death of Dr. Gentili,
2 57- 2 5 8 I career of Father Fur
long, 258-260 ; account of the
great mission in Manchester
(1845-1846), 261-268
Sects in Japan, 333 et seq.
Secular " priest-printers," 98 et seq
Secundus, Abbot of Trent, 30
Sedgwick, 175
Seebohm, 155
2TJ/u(.a (a mound), 10
Semitic races, burial customs of,

16

Senates of Universities and Refor
mation, 182
Septuagint, 18
Sergius I., Pope, 225
Serqueyra, Bishop Luiz, S.J., 311,

318, 331 note
Sessa, Duke of, 150 note
Seville, 196

Sheehan, Rev. W. J., 265
Sheldonian Theatre, Oxford, 197
Shetlands transferred from province

of York to that of Nidaros, 64
Shimabara, siege of and massacre

at, 315, 320
Shintoism disestablished in Japan,

330 note
Shirwood, Robert, 195 - 196, 199,

203
Shogunate system of government,

308 ; overthrow of, 327
Shrewsbury, John, Earl of, 286-287
Siam burial customs, 6 note, 24
Sidotti, Father John Baptist, S.J.,

316

Siena, Republic of, 149
Signini, Father, 251
Sigurd, Prince of Norway, 64
" Silver Age " in Spain, 6, 12
Simeon Metaphrastes, 235
Siret, MM. Henri and Louis, their

discoveries in Spain, 5, 6
Sixtus IV., Pope, 128 note
Sixtus V. , Pope, and the Litany of
Loreto, 229 ; receives Japanese
embassy, 307
Slav, printed books, 97
Smith, Doctor of Canon Law at

Cambridge, 165
Smith, Mr. James, 276
Smith, Dr. Richard, 174, 175, 199,

204-205
Smith, Dr. William, second Arch

bishop of St. Andrews and Edin
burgh, 276

Smith, Dr. William, 223

Smith, Rev. Fr. Thomas, 265

Smith, Sir Thomas, 183

Snelling, Fr. William, O.S.B., 161

Snorro, 64

" Socie te des Missions Etrangeres"
and missions to Japan, 319-341,
passim

" Society for the Propagation of the
Gospel " in Japan, 334

Solon, 12

Somaschi, Order of the, Clerks
Regular of, 139

Somerset, Duke of, Protector, 174,

J 75
Sontheim, convent of discalced

Franciscans at, 98
Sopewell, convent of, 96
Sorbonne at Paris visited by Adrian

VI., 117
Sotelo, Bishop Luis, O.S.F., 315,

331 note
Spalding, Dr. Bishop, of Peoria,

296, 297
Speakman, Miss, M.A., and Abbey

of St. Rufus, 60 note
Spedding, James, 184 note
Spelman, 155, 163
Spiegel, Orientalist, 217
Spoleto, dukedom of, 40
Spolverini, Mgr. , Papal Internuncio

at the Hague, 352
Spooner, William, publisher, 276
" Spy race," 3
Srephah, note on its meaning in

2 Chron. xvi., v. 14, 17
St. Albans, Abbey of, 55, 56, 96
St. Ambrose, 236 note
St. Anselm, 49, 235, 236
St. Augustine, 60, 61, 235
St. Avitus, 224
St. Basil, 235
St. Bede, 31, 32, 155 note
St. Bernard, 236
St. Bonaventure, 225, 235, 236
St. Catherine, island of, contains

traces of cremated remains, 20
St. Charles Borromeo, 267
St. Dominic, 158, 240, 253
St. Edmund Rich, Archbishop of

Canterbury, 157, 185
St. Ephrem of Edessa, 200, 219 and

note, 235, 236 and note
St. Epiphanius, 235, 236

INDEX

St. Francis of Assisi, 240, 253
St. Francis Borgia "coaches" Em
peror Charles V. in mathematics,

"5

St. Francis Xavier on the curiosity of
the Japanese, 301 note; lands at
Goa, 302 ; meets two Japanese at
Malacca, 302; lands at Kago-
shima, 303 ; the Prince is favour
able to Christianity, 303 - 304 ;
speaks highly of Japanese charac
ter, 304 ; work during his two
years stay, 304 ; death, 306
St. Frideswide s Church, Oxford,

168

St. Gaetano, 139

St. Gertrude s Church, Louvain, 205
St. Gregory Nazianzen, 235
St. Gregory of Nicomedia, 236
St. Gregory Thaumaturgus, 235
St. Gregory the Great and pagan
practices, 347. See also Gregory
the Great
Ste. Gudule, Church of, at Brussels,

130
St. Ignatius Loyola, 123, 139, 150,

312

St. Ildephonsus, 235
St. Isidore of Seville, 37
St. Jerome, 186, 235
St. Jerome Emilian, 139
St. John Damascene, 235, 236
St. John, Father, of the Oratory,

239

St. John, Miss, 289
St. John s College, Cambridge, 171

et seq,

St. John s College, Oxford, 177, 179
St. Joseph, devotion of the survivors

of early Japanese Christianity to,

3 2 S

St. Joseph Hymnographus, 236
St. Laurence Justinian, 236
St. Mamertus, 224
St. Mary s Church, Oxford, 168, 210
St. Mary s Church, Utrecht, Adrian

VI., canon and treasurer of, in
St. Mary Major, Church of, Rome,

149

St. Methodius, 235, 236 note
St. Michael, church of, at Louvain,

209 note

St. Norbert, 59 note
St. Olaf, King, 64
St. Paul of Chartres, nuns of go to

Japan, 328

St. Paul of the Cross, 243

St. Peter Damian, 236

St. Peter s, Anderlecht (Brussels),

Adrian VI., Canon of, in
St. Peter s, Douay, 205
St. Peter s, collegiate church at

Louvain, 207
St. Pius V. , Pope, 152
St. Quentin (Maubeuge), Adrian

VI., Provost of, in
St. Rufus, monastery of, at Avignon,

58, 59, 60, 79
St. Simon Stock, 236
St. Stephen Harding, 155 note
St. Thomas Aquinas, 112
St. Thomas of Canterbury, 78
St. Ursula s Convent, Louvain, 205
"St. Vitus s dance" and the

Dancing Procession of Echter-

nach, 347-348
St. Willibrord, 155 note ; chap, xiii.,

passim
St. Yrier de la Perche, monastery of,

near Limoges, 98
Stapleton, Dr. Thomas, 180, 185
Statue of our Lady, first carried in

public procession at Coventry,

2 5S
Stavenger, John, Bishop of, created

Metropolitan, 64; extent of his

jurisdiction, 64
Steichen Abbe, 337, 340, 343
Stockholm, art of printing in, 92
Storey, John, Blessed, 199, 208, 212,
Strabo, 29

Stradlynge, Thomas, 209 note
Strasburg, Carthusian press at, 97
Strauss, 186

Strongbow, Earl of Striguil, 83
Subiaco, Abbey of, 94
Suliman II., 127, 144-145
Sulla, 13
Suppression of the monasteries, 172

et seq, 195
Surat, 214-215
Sus, discovery of cremated remains

at, 18
Sutri, 71
" Suttee " or widow-burning not

practised in Vedic times, io-n
Swabians, 39, 43
Sweden, Cardinal Nicholas Break-

speare s mission to, 65
Sweynheym, Konrad, 94
Swinburne, Mr., and the story of
Rosamund, 39 and note

INDEX

379

Swiss Protestants in Japan, 334

Sylva, Father, S.J., 317

Synod, P irst Provincial of Japan,

3 2 9

Syriac version of New Testament,
189

Tablet, 154 note, 257-258, 271
Tacitus, 29, 43
Taiko-Sama. See Hideyoshi
Takeyama (Justus Ucondono) exiled

to Philippines, 312
Tarleton, A. H., on Adrian IV.,

chap. iii. passim
Tarragona, 136
Tato, 35

Taylor, Dr. Isaac, 9
Temporal power of the Pope, 84
Tetsujiro, Professor Inoue, attack

on Christianity, 336
Thatcher, Professor, O.J., 81, 82

note, 89

Theatines, congregation of the, 139
Theodolinda, Queen, and conver
sion of Lombards, 41, 42
Theodoricus Martinus Alostensis

(Thierry Martens of Alost), 191
Theophilus, schismatic Patriarch of

Alexandria, 150
Thijm, Professor Alberdingk, 155

note, 297

Thinx (an assembly), 48
Thiofred, Abbot, 347
Thomas a Kempis, 95, 106, 107,

190
Thompson, Mr. Edward Healy,

293

Thoth, 187

Thsathsa (small image), 15
Thucydides, 12
Gj^ujSos, 10

Tiara in Adrian IV. s time, 52 note
Tiberius, 29
Tiele, 186
Tierney, Rev. M. A., historian,

276
Times, the, and the only English

Pope, 60 note

Tiptoft, Earl of Worcester, 161
Tivoli, 74
Toledo holds out against Charles V.,

122

Tortona, 69
Totu, Melania Kustugi (Sister

Mary), 328
Towers of Silence, 14

Tractarian movement and the

Dublin Review, 288
Transactions of the Japan Asiatic

Society, 313, 315
Transactions of the Royal Society of

Canada on "Carrier Sociology

and Mythology," 21 note
"Traveller s Song," 44
Travers, " Ecclesiasticse Disciplines

Explicatio," 181
Treaties with Japan, 322
Tree-burial of America, 21
Trelawney, Sir Henry, Bart., 250
Trent, " priest - printers " at, 99;

Council of, in, 148, 207
Tresham, 175
Trilingual College at Louvain, 191

et seq.
Trinity College, Cambridge, 171,

174, 176

Trinity College, Oxford, 177
Trollope, "Memoir of the Life of

Adrian IV.," 53

Trondhjem (formerly Nidaros), 64
Tubingen, 194
Turanians, 14
Turks and Adrian VI., 143 et seq. t

149
Turner, Rev. William (afterwards

first Bishop of Salford), 265
Turrecremata, Cardinal, 99
Tuscany, 40
Tyburn, 208

Tyler, Professor E. B., 4
Tynwald, etymology of word, 48

note

Uberto, Archbishop of Milan, 86

Ullathorne, Dr., Bishop of Birming
ham, 297

Ulm, printing-press at, 92

Umbria, 40

Un-gen (or On-sen), Christians tor
tured in the caves of, 314

Unitarians in Japan, 334

United Presbyterians of Scotland in
Japan, 334

United States first opens up Japan,
322

Universities, English, and the Refor
mation : greatness of their loss to
Catholicism, 154-155 ; for the most
part ecclesiastical in foundation
and development, 156 et seq. ; the
work of the friars, 157 et seq. ;
character and discipline, 160 ;

380

INDEX

foundations of the fifteenth cen
tury, 160-161 ; " Humanism " at
Oxford and Cambridge^ 161 et
seq. ; Lutheranism at, 165 et seq.;
the question of the royal divorce,
168 et seq. ; the plundering and
enslaving of the, 171 et seq. ; the
Commission of Visitation, 174 et
seq. ; the effect of Queen Mary s
reign on, 176 et seq. ; Elizabeth
and the, 178 et seq. struggle be
tween Anglicanism and Puritan
ism at, 1 80 et seq. ; summary of
the results of the Reformation in
the, 181 et seq. ; on the studies,
182-183 5 on college life and dis
cipline, 183 ; on the class of
students, 183 ; the trend of
modern reform, 184-185 ; biblio
graphy, 185

Unsworth, Rev. Edward, 265

Unsworth, Rev. Thomas, 265

Urakami Islands, 327

Urban VIII., Pope, and Japanese
martyrs, 323

" Utopia," Sir Thomas More s, 204
note i

Utrecht, 105, 109, 150, 153

Uyeno museum in Tokyo, 314-315

Valens, Didaco, S.J., Bishop of

Japan, 331 note
Valenziani, Professor, on Japanese

embassies to the Holy See, 307

note
Valerius, Andreas, 104 note, 188,

191, 192, 195, 205
Valignani, Father Alessandro, S.J.,

307

Valladolid, monastic press at, 98

Vandals, 26, 33, 41

Van den Gheyn, Pere, S.J., on
cradle land of Aryans, 9 note

Van de Steere, Chrysostom, 58

Van Enkenvoert, Cardinal William ,
131, 150, 151

Van Even, Ed., 190 note

Varuna, 187

Vasselon, Henri, S.M.E., Bishop
of Osaka, 331 note

Vatican Library, 227

Vaughan, Cardinal, 62 note, 95, 274-
275, 293, 295, 296, 298, 299

Vaughan, Dom Roger Bede (after
wards Archbishop of Sydney), 293

" Vedas," Louvain and the, 187

Velleius, Paterculus, 26, 29

" Vendidad," MSS. of the, 213

Venice, Minorite press at, 97
liturgical works printed at, 97 ;
monastic press at, 98 ; " priest-
printers " at, 98 ; Adrian VI. and,
135, 144, 149

Venturinus, Prior of Savona, 96

Vermigli (Peter Martyr), 121, 174,
175, 177, 204

Vernulaeus, 104 note

Vespucci, Provost of the Duomo at
Florence, 98

Via Appia, 12

Vienne, 224

Vigroux, Abbe", 332

Villaler, Battle of, 122

Villefranche, 136 A

Villiers de 1 lie- Adam, Grand-
Master of Knights Hospitallers of
St. John, 144, 145

Vincenza, " priest-printers " at, 99

Virgil on building of funeral pyre, n

Visconti, 50

Visigoths, 16, 26

Vitelli, Cornelio, 161

Viterbo, Adrian IV. at, 76

Vitoria, 123-125, 137

Vives, Louis, 131 ; 147, 163, 164

Vogt, Albert, on Catholicism in
Japan, 354

Von der Linde, 90 note, 94

Von Pflugck-Harttung, 81

Von Stolzenberg-Luttmersen, 36

Vorstman, 196

Wackerbarth, Rev. Francis, 251

Wadstena, convent of St. Bridget
at, 98

Waghenare, Petrus, 57, 58

Wakefield, Robert, Orientalist, 182
and note, 194, 195

Wakefield, Thomas, Professor -of
Hebrew at Cambridge, 183, 195

Ward, Dr. William George, 239 ;
connection with Dublin Review,
270-272, 274, 281, 288, 290-294,
295, 298

Ward, Mrs. Humphrey, 186

Ward, Mr. Wilfred, 275

Warham, Archbishop of Canter
bury, 163, 170

Warka, burial-ground at, 16

Warwick, Duke of Northumberland,

174- 175
Washington University, 154

INDEX

Waston, 163

Water burial among Germans and
Scandinavians, 16 ; among Ameri
can Indians, 21

Watford, 55 !

Weapons, utensils, food, etc., buried
with bodies, 23

Webb, Abbot John, of Coventry,
196 note

Werner, Dr. K. , 155 note

Werner, Rolewinck, the Carthusian,

9i

Wesley, John, 247

Wessel, John, of Groningen, 190

Wessel, John, of Oberwesel, 190
note

West, Bishop of Ely, 166

Westergaard, Orientalist, 217

Westmoreland, Earl of, 209 note

Westrum, 36

White, Father, S.J., and so-called
Bull " Laudabiliter," 80

White, Sir Thomas, 177

Whitgift, Dr. (Archbishop of Can
terbury), 179, 181

Whittaker, Rev. J. F., 265

Widsith, "Traveller s Song" attri
buted to, 44, 46

Wilberforce, Mr. W. H., 271, 293

William of Croy, Marquis of
Chievres, 117, 121

William II., Abbot of St. Rufus, 60

William II. , King of Sicily, quarrels
with Adrian IV. , 75

William of Ockham, 159

William the Conqueror, 83

Wilson, Robert, 199, 202

Wimbledon, Battle of, 38 note

Wimpheling, Jacob, 91-92

Winchester, archives of, 82 - 83 ;
School, 161, 206, 208

Winnili, 32, 33, 35-37, 41, 42, 51

Wiseman, Cardinal, 241 ; connec

tion with Dublin Revieiv, chap,
xi., passim

Witte, Bernhard, 91

Wittemberg, 193

Wives, slaves, buried with husband
and master, 23

Wodan (or Godan), 33, 37, 41, 43

Wolgernuth, engravings of, 100

Wolsey, Cardinal, 126, 128, 130,
131, 138, 148, 163, 167, 170, 205

Wood, Antony, historian, 155, 204

Wootton, Nicholas, Dean of Canter
bury, 202 note

Worms, Diet of, 146

Wycliffism, 165

Ximenes (Jimenes), Cardinal, 118 et
seq., 152, 189, 192

"Yih-King," Louvain and the, 187
Yokohama, dedication of chapel at,

3 2 3
Yoritomo and Shogimate system of

government, 308, 327
York, See of, loses jurisdiction over

Orkneys, Shetlands, and Isle of

Man, 64
Young, 174, 175

Zarathushtra or Zoroaster, 13, 214
et seq.

Zedekiah, 17

Zeuss, 36, 42

Zimmer on cremation and inhuma
tion in Vedic times, n

Zimmermann, Father A., S.J., on
the English Universities and the
Reformation, chap. vi. passim,
192 note, 195

Zinna (or Cenna), monastery at, 98

Zoroaster, 13, 214 et seq.

Zwinglians, 169, 175

Zwolle, 107, 190

?. AND T. WASHBOURNE, 1 ATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON.

TABLET
BOOK DEPARTMENT